Note 045 Edacitas in Graecas gula est, in Gallis natura (Dialog. i. c. 4, p. 521). Cassian fairly owns that the perfect model of abstinence cannot be imitated in Gaul, on account of the aerum temperies, and the qualitas nostrae fragilitatis (Institut. iv. 11). Among the Western rules, that of Columbanus is the most austere: he had been educated amidst the poverty of Ireland, as rigid, perhaps, and inflexible as the abstemious virtue of Egypt. The rule of Isidore of Seville is the mildest: on holidays he allows the use of flesh.

---

The History Of The Decline and Fall Of The Roman Empire—Volume 1— Chapter 37