Chapter LXVII. How from the Blows of the Demons he Knew it was More Pleasing to the Lord that he should Stay in Poor and Humble Dwellings Rather Than with Cardinals

ON a certain time blessed Francis went to Rome to visit my Lord of Ostia. And when he had remained some days with him, he visited also my Lord Leo the Cardinal, who was very devoted to the blessed men. And because it was then winter, and altogether unfit for going on foot because of the cold and the winds and the rain, he asked him to abide with him some days, and as a beggar to receive his food from him, with the other beggars who daily used to eat in his house. But this he said, because he knew that the blessed man ever would be received like a beggar wherever he was guested, though the Cardinals and the Lord Pope would receive him with the greatest devotion and reverence, and would venerate him as a saint. And he added, "I will give thee a good house apart where thou mayest abide and where thou canst pray and eat as thou wishest." Then Friar Angelo Tancredi, who was one of the twelve first friars, who also abode with the said Cardinal, said to the blessed man, "Brother, there is near here a certain tower right spacious and apart, where thou mayest abide as if in a hermitage." And when the blessed man had seen it, it pleased him, and returning to the Lord Cardinal he said to him, "My Lord, perchance I will stay with you for some days." And my Lord Cardinal rejoiced greatly. So Brother Angelo went and prepared the place in the tower for the blessed man and his fellow. And because blessed Francis would not come down from thence as long as he should remain with the Cardinal nor wish any one to enter to him, Brother Angelo promised and took orders to daily carry food to him and his fellow. And when the blessed Father had gone there with his fellow; on the first night when he would sleep there, came demons and beat him very sore. And calling his fellow he said to him, "Brother, demons have beaten me very sore, and therefore I will that thou remain with me, for I fear to stay alone." And that night his fellow abode near him. For blessed Francis trembled as a man who suffers fever, wherefore both watched through the whole night. In the meantime the holy Father said to his fellow, "Why have the demons beaten me, and why is that power of hurting me given them by the Lord? "And he said, "The demons are the sergeants of our Lord. For as the Podesta sends his sergeants to punish him who has sinned, so the Lord by sergeants, that is, by the demons who in this world are His ministers, corrects and chastens those whom He loves. For many times he who is a perfect Religious sins ignorantly; whence since he knows not his sin, he is chastened by demons, that he may diligently see and consider, within and without, those things in which he has offended, for whom the Lord loves with a true love, nothing in them He leaves unpunished. But by the mercy and grace of God, I know not that I have offended in anything which I have not amended by confession and satisfaction, nay, by His mercy God has granted me this gift that I may receive in prayer a clear knowledge of all things in which I may please or displease Him. But it may be that He now chastises me by His sergeants for that though my Lord Cardinal willingly showed me mercy, and though it is necessary to my body to receive this rest, yet my brethren who go through the world bearing hunger and many tribulations and the other friars who live in hermitages and poor little dwellings, when they shall hear that I live with my Lord Cardinal, may have an occasion of murmuring, saying, ' We bear so many adverse tilings, and he has his consolations.' But I am bound always to give them a good example, because for this reason I was given unto them. For the brethren are more edified when I abide in their own poor little dwellings amongst them, than in others; and they bear their tribulations more patiently when they hear that I bear also the same." And it was, therefore, the highest and continual study of our Father, that in all things he might afford a good example, and that he might take away any occasion of murmuring concerning him from other friars. And on account of this, well or ill, he suffered so much, that whichever friars knew him as we who were with him to the day of his death did, as often as they read

*! 485 those things or call them to memory, cannot contain themselves from tears, and they sustain all their tribulations and necessities with greater patience and joy. Therefore blessed Francis came down very early from the tower, and went to my Lord Cardinal; telling him all things that had befallen him and what he had borne" with his fellow: nay, he said to him, "Men think me to be a holy man, and behold demons have cast me out of a cell! "And my Lord Cardinal was much rejoiced with him. Yet because he knew and venerated him as a saint, he would not contradict him after he was unwilling to remain there. And so the holy man bidding him farewell, returned to the hermitage of Fonte Palumbo, near Rieti,