st. john of damascus (676-749 - Cristo Raul

2 ST. JOHN OF DAMASCUS.
and decisive change in his career. But that change
the change from the excitement of state affairs to
the seclusion of a monastery was probably due to
the bent of his own mind, and would have equally
taken place amid other surroundings. It is with the
Convent of St. Sabas, or with Jerusalem, that we
associate the really prolific period of his life. When
there, Damascus was to him but one spot in that
outer world which he had forsaken. From that time
forward we fail to discern that it had any special
interest for him.
Still, as being after all the place in which he first
drew breath, Damascus cannot fail to have a strong
interest for anyone studying the life of this dis
tinguished scion of And it. even apart from this,
Damascus has claims on our regard such as few
other cities possess. For it is
probably the most
ancient city now standing in the world. It was
existing in the days of Abraham, whose steward
Eliezer was a native of it.
Josephus ascribes its
foundation to Uz, a grandson of Shem. Its chequered
fortune during the reigns of the kings of Israel is
familiar to us from the Bible story.
While Rome was
as yet scarcely founded, one long term of the history
of Damascus was being brought to a close by its cap
ture by Tiglath-Pileser, when its leading inhabitants
were carried away captives to Kir. For a long period
after this, partly from its
being but an appanage of
the Assyrian empire, and partly from the subsequent
rise of the rival city of Antioch,
it remained in com
parative obscurity. A passing compliment to its
beauty
and importance by Strabo, a notice of the alabaster