Forgetfulness And Fasting

Si quis igitur secretis eremi delectatus, oblivioni tradere potuit humana consortia, ac secundum Ieremiam dicere: Et diem hominis non desideravi, tu scis; ego quoque id, Domino sua gratia largiente, vel assecutum vel certe assequi annisum fuisse me fateor. Itaque pio Domini nostri munere memini me in huiusmodi raptum frequenter excessum, ut obliviscerer me sarcina corporeae fragilitatis indutum, mentemque meam ita omnes exteriores sensus subito respuisse, et a cunctis materialibus rebus omnimodis exsulasse, ut neque oculi neque aures meae proprio fungerentur officio; et ita divinis meditationibus ac spiritalibus theoriis animus replebatur, ut saepe ad vesperam cibum me percepisse nescirem, ac sequente die de hesterna absolutione ieiunii penitus dubitarem. Ob quam etiam causam septem dierum cibus, hoc est, septem paximaciorum paria sequestratim in procherio, id est, amanuensi sporta die sabbati reponuntur, ut refectio praetermissa non lateat. Qua consuetudine illius quoque oblivionis error excluditur, ut expletum hebdomadae cursum, ac solemnitatem diei ipsius revolutam, finitus panum indicet numerus, festivitasque diei sacrae et congregationis solemnitas solitarium latere non possit. Quod si etiam hunc ordinem ille quem praediximus mentis excessus forte turbaverit, nihilominus quotidiani operis modus dierum numerum signans, arcet errorem. Sanctus Ioannes Cassianus, Collationes, Collatio XIX, Caput IV, De Fine Coenobitae et Eremitae Source: Migne PL 49.1130b-1131a

Therefore if someone delights in the remote places of the desert and would forget human association and with Jeremiah say: 'You know that I have not desired the day of man,' 1 I confess that I also, by the blessing of God's grace, achieved this or certainly tried to achieve it. And thus by the pious gift of the Lord I remember that I was often caught up into such rapture that I forgot I was endowed with the burden of a weak body, and my mind suddenly rejected all external senses and entirely severed itself off from all material objects, so that neither my eyes nor my ears performed their proper functions, and my soul was so filled with Divine meditations and spiritual contemplations that often at evening I did not know whether I had taken any food, and on the following day I was extremely doubtful whether I had broken my fast yesterday. Because of which, a supply of food for seven days, that is, seven sets of small cakes, were set apart in a hand-basket, and laid by on Saturday, that there might be no doubt when a meal had been overlooked. By which custom another error of forgetfulness was excluded, for when the number of cakes was exhausted, it showed that the course of the week was over, and that the services of the same day had come round, and so the festival and holy day and services of the congregation could not be hidden from the solitary. Because even if that rapture of mind spoken of should perhaps interfere with this arrangement, yet still the method of the days' work would show the number of the days and prevent error. Saint John Cassian, Conferences, from Conference 19, Chapter 4, On The Aim of the Coenobite and the Hermit 1 Jerem 17.16