In AD 313, Constantine declared Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire, and the persecution of the Christians ceased.  Subsequently, the number of religious recluses proliferated.  Hermits retreated in droves to the Scetis Desert of Egypt, paradoxically seeking solitude.  By the fifth century, many had gathered into cenobitic societies that later evolved into monasteries.  Some renunciants, however, explored styles of seclusion that featured ever-more rigorous, innovative, and questionable displays of self-discipline and physical austerity.One of these solitaries gained world renown as the first of what were known as "stylites," or pillar saints, from the ancient Greek word stylos, meaning pillar.  The son of a shepherd from the Amanus Mountains of Syria, Simeon joined a monastic community at the age of 16 but felt called to a more reclusive and stringent mode of existence.  Withdrawing to a nearby hut, he took up such self-mortifying practices as abstaining from food and drink throughout the whole of Lent and standing upright for as long as possible.  After three years of this voluntary confinement, he settled upon a rocky prominence in the desert where he continued his practice, at times overwhelmed by the pilgrims who thronged to hear his spiritual counsel.When Simeon spied a pillar amidst the ancient ruins of the surrounding area, he contrived a new, radical method of sequestration by constructing a small platform at the top of the column where he could stand.  There he vowed to live out the remainder of his days, exposed to every vagary of weather.  Village boys climbed a ladder to deliver supplies.Simeon was not, however, without precursors.  Among purported proto-stylites was Epidus, a recluse from Palestine who dwelt in a mountaintop cave for 25 years.  Saint Gregory of Nazianzus told of a fourth-century solitary who stood for years without lying down.  Theodoret, Simeon's contemporary and Bishop of Cyrus, reported that a hermit had lived for 10 years inside a tub suspended in midair by poles.As Simeon's fame spread throughout the Byzantine or Eastern Roman Empire, he mounted increasingly taller pillars to escape the madding crowds; his vertical reclusion ultimately reached 80 feet.  For the next 37 years, Simeon stood on the platform atop his pillar, perfecting his self-mortifying exercises and preaching twice a day.  Although certain critics deemed this lifestyle a pointless, self-willed martyrdom, he won the veneration of Emperor Theodosius.  Moreover, the pathos of the stylite's demise was testimony to his conviction.  As Edward Gibbon relates in his history of the Roman Empire, "The progress of an ulcer in [his] thigh might shorten, but could not disturb, this celestial life, and the patient Hermit expired, without descending from his column."Simeon inspired more than a few imitators.  As one scholar commented, "For the next century…stylites were a common sight throughout the Byzantine Levant."  For many pillar dwellers, a rudimentary shelter built onto the top of the column helped to mitigate the effects of exposure.  Female pillar saints were not unheard of, and there were reports of stylites who found themselves stationed close enough to debate theological issues from their respective posts.  Among notable followers, Simeon the Younger took up a perch near his predecessor's in Aleppo in Syria while Daniel the Stylite occupied a column near Constantinople for 33 years.  In the sixth century, Simeon's feat was surpassed by Alypius, who is said to have dwelt atop his pillar for a total of 67 years, the last 14 of which he spent lying down.  Nevertheless, it was Simeon's reputation that, for better or worse, endured.  In 1833, the English poet Tennyson composed an ironic verse in which the stylite boasts, "Show me the man hath suffered more than I."Passage Title: Simeon the Stylite Question 27In affirming Simeon's life as a stylite, Gibbon points out in Paragraph 5 that "the patient Hermit expired, without descending from his column."  Gibbon's statement suggests that:A.to be successful as a stylite, one must exert an iron will.B.pillar dwellers inspire more admiration than do other types of religious recluses.C.achieving genuine piety demands that one rely on a deeper sense of purpose.D.stylites are the most devout of religious recluses.Submit