It is right for a holy man aflame with divine passion to leave his own home and choose the desert as his dwelling. It is right for him to sell all hi… - Eucherius of Lyon

The cell in the desert truly deserves to be called the ark of strength, the seat of faith, the tabernacle of charity, the treasury of piety, the storehouse of justice. For just as in a home precious objects and valuables are kept in a hidden place behind locked doors, so also those magnificent gifts of desert sanctity are put away in a cell in some desert protected by natural inaccessibility, lest they decay because of exposure to worldliness. The desert is an ideal place for the Lord of all to preserve his precious ornament of sanctity, not only to store it there but to bring it out of its hiding place when it is needed.

The desert holds them as in their mothers’ lap while they long for eternity, despising this brief life; indifferent to the present life, they are confident of the life to come. In this way, by hastening toward the world’s end, they manage to attain the world without end.

I am convinced that God, in foreknowledge of the future, prepared the desert for the saints to come. I believe he wanted some parts of the world to be rich in the fruits of agriculture and other parts, with drier climate, to abound with holy men. In this way the desert would bear fruit. When he ‘watered the hills from the heights above’, the valleys were filled with plentiful crops. And he planned to endow the sterile deserts with inhabitants, lest any land go to waste.