Chapter CXXXVIII. How he would have slanderers punished

Of Slander

182. Finally, since the spirit filled with charity hates those that are hateful to God, this quality also flourished in S. Francis. Surely he held slanderers in horror and execration above all other kinds of wicked men, saying that they carry poison on their tongues and taint others therewith. Talebearers, therefore, as biting fleas, he avoided, and (as we ourselves have seen) turned away his ears when they were speaking that they might not be defiled by hearing such things. Thus when he once heard one brother blackening the reputation of another, he turned to his vicar, brother Peter Cathanii, and spoke these terrible words: "There is instant danger to the Order unless slanderers are put down. The sweet savour of many will soon stink unless the mouths of the stinking ones are stopped. Arise, arise, examine carefully, and if thou find the accused brother innocent, punish the accuser so severely as to render him a marked man. Hand him over to the Florentine bruiser if thou canst not punish him thyself. (He used to call brother John of Florence, a man of high stature and great strength, 'the bruiser'.) Do thou and all the Ministers give the utmost heed that this pestilent disease spread no further."

Sometimes he sentenced one who had stripped his brother of the glory of his good name to be stripped of his tunic, and suffered him not to lift up his eyes to God unless he had first restored that which he had taken away. Hence it was that the brethren of that time, making as it were a special abjuration of this vice, had firmly agreed together carefully to shun all [discourse] that might detract from the honour of others or redound to their disgrace. Well done, indeed! For what is a slanderer but the gall of humanity, the leaven of wickedness, the infamy of the world? What is a double-tongued man but the scandal of Religion, the poison of the cloister, the breaker-up of unity? Alas! the earth's surface is full of poisonous animals, nor can any good man escape the teeth of envious rivals. Rewards are offered to informers, and when innocence has been undermined the palm is sometimes given to falsehood. Lo! if any one cannot live by his own honesty he may earn food and clothing by laying waste the honesty of others. 183. Accordingly, S. Francis often used to say: "These are the slanderer's words: ' I lack perfection of life; I have no store of learning or of peculiar grace; and so I have no standing either with God or with men. I know what I will do: I will besmirch the elect and curry favour with those in authority. I know that my Superior is but a man and that at times he follows the same plan as I — to cut down the cedars so that the bramble alone may be seen in the wood.' ": Go, wretch, feed on human flesh, and since thou canst not live otherwise, gnaw the entrails of thy brethren! Such men strive to appear good, not to become so; they accuse others of vices, but do not put them away themselves. They praise those alone by whose authority they desire to be cherished; uttering no praises but such as they think will be reported to him they have praised. They trade on the pale face of abstinence for pernicious praises that they may appear spiritual men "who judge all things but themselves are judged by no man". Let them rejoice in the report of sanctity, not in the fact, in the name of angels, not in the power !¹ [S. FRANCIS'] DESCRIPTION OF A MINISTER-GENERAL