quite young have become as it were of equal age with those who have long been advanced in years. And though they see the race of man on earth thus dwindling ever and being exhausted, they do not tremble,[160] as its total extinction proceeds and draws near. (_From another Easter Letter_) [This fragment is given in the _Sacra Parallela Rupefucald._, fol. 70 and 71, where it is ascribed to Dionysius’s “Fourth Easter Letter.” It is by no means clear which Letter is meant, but the main thought (of the cunning devices by which Love wins its way) is quaintly beautiful and well worthy of our author] Love leaps out in utmost eagerness to confer some benefit even on an unwilling object: yea, often on one who shrinks in shame and tries to shun kind treatment from dislike of being burdensome to another, and would fain put up with his annoyances alone, in order not to cause trouble and inconvenience to any. He that is full of Love craves leave to suffer and endure: to be in evil case, he thinks, gives opportunity for being helped, and he will do the greatest favour to another, not himself, if through that other the evil, which is his own, is made to cease.[161] To Basilides, Bishop of the Churches in the Pentapolis (Cyrenaica) [This canonical Letter was accepted at the third Council of Constantinople _in Trullo_ (A.D. 680)] Dionysius to Basilides my beloved son and brother and godly fellow-worker, greeting in the Lord. (1) You sent to me, my most faithful and learned son, to inquire at what hour one ought to end the fast before Easter.[162] For you say that some of the brethren maintain one should do so at cockcrow:[163] and some at evening.[164] For the brethren in Rome, so they say, await the cockcrow: but concerning those in the Pentapolis you said they broke the fast sooner. And you ask me to set an exact limit and a definite hour, which is both difficult and risky. For it will be acknowledged by all alike that one ought to start the feast and the gladness after the time of our Lord’s resurrection, up till then humbling our souls with fastings. But by what you have written to me, you have quite soundly and with a good insight into the Divine Gospels established the fact that nothing definite appears in them about the hour at which He rose. For the Evangelists described those that came to the tomb diversely—that is, at different times, and all[165] said that they have found the Lord already risen: it was “late on the Sabbath day,” as S. Matthew puts it:[166] and “early while it was yet dark,” as S. John writes; and “at early dawn,” as S. Luke; and “very early ... when the sun was risen,” as S. Mark. And when He rose, no one has clearly stated; but that “late on the Sabbath day, as it began to dawn towards the first day of the week,” about sunrise on that day those who arrived at the tomb found Him no longer lying in it, that is agreed to. And we must not imagine that the