Chapter XLV. Rebuke of a brother refusing to beg

75. Blessed Francis often used to say that a true Lesser Brother ought not to remain long without going for alms. "And the nobler my son is," said he, "the readier let him be to go, for in suchwise merits are heaping up for him."

There was in a certain "place "a brother who was a cipher at begging, but at table a number: and the Saint, observing that he was a friend of the belly and an unworking sharer in the fruits, once addressed him thus: "Go thy way, brother fly, for thou wouldst eat the sweat of thy brethren and be idle in God's work. Thou art like brother drone who though he endures not the toil of the bees wants to be the first to eat the honey." That carnal man, perceiving that his gluttony had been found out, went back to the world which he had not yet forsaken: for he quitted the Religion: and the "cipher at begging "was now no brother, and he who had been "a number at table" became a manifold devil.