Ceres were separated from their husbands,[200:6] and the Therapeutæ were rigid monks who lived about the time of Jesus.[200:7] These influences and examples, coupled with Platonic philosophy, and the interpretation put upon the teachings and lives of Jesus and His Apostles, produced Christian monasticism. Jesus Himself was unmarried, poor, and had not "where to lay his head." He commanded the rich young man to sell his property for the poor,[200:8] and said: "Take no thought for the morrow what ye shall eat and what ye shall drink, or wherewithal ye shall be clothed." St. John and probably other Apostles were celibates.[200:9] The Apostles likewise taught that following Jesus meant "forsaking father, mother, brethren, wife, children, houses and lands."[201:1] They urged Christians to crucify the flesh, and disparaged marriage,[201:2] and they too were poor and homeless like their Master.[201:3] The supreme question asked by earnest Christians in all ages has been this: "What is the true, the ideal Christian life?"[201:4] At every step of her progress the Church has given a different answer to the important query. Yet in all this divergent opinion there is plainly seen one common conviction. To live in the service of God, in the religious denunciation of the world, and in the abnegation of the joys of life--that is the universal reply. In the early Church this position was very strongly emphasised and led, in consequence, to the rise of monasticism. Hence it may be said that the monastic ideals simply expressed the highest ideals of the Church, and the history of monasticism becomes a vital part of the history of the mediæval Church.