Blanquerna

OF PERSECUTION

The Canon of Persecution considered the greatness of the burden that was entrusted to him by reason of his office, that he might use juflice. It happened one day that he 299

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passed before a tavern, wherein had gathered together a great company of gamblers and of gluttons and of loose¬ living men, who were drinking in the tavern and singing and dancing and playing inftruments of music. The Canon entered the tavern and bought wine, and danced with the gamblers, and recited these verses concerning Our Lady :

To thee, My Lady Mary, holy Maid,

I dedicate my will, which is aflame With love so fierce that cannot be allayed,

Nor aught desires or loves beside thy fame All my desires are more effectual made Than any such as on thee are not flayed,

Of men that love not, Mother of love, thy name :

Who loves thee not, no other love may claim.

Since all my love thy power has now obeyed My knowledge and remembrance can ft thou claim For once my love before thy feet is laid The reft arc naught to me. Do thou inflame With love our threefold powers,1 O blessed Maid,

That we2 may go to Syria unafraid The souls of unbelievers fierce to tame And give to Chriftians peace in Jesus’ Name.

How many boaft that if occasion came,

Right gladly they would die by sword or flame !

But oh, how few will go on God’s Crusade For when they think on Death they arc dismayed !

2. When he had recited these verses, he begged all the company to be seated and to drink with him, and to relate such things as should be agreeable. While the Canon was among these folk, the men that passed along the flreet scoffed and reproved him because he was in the company of men so vile ; but the Canon did all in his power that he might be loved by those that were in his company, and they all had great delight therein, and made him to be their chief, and liflened to the words which he spake to them

■ il['m0ry’ understanding and will.

’ Ttc reference is apparently to the clergy in general.

OF PERSECUTION

concerning Jesus Chrifl and the Apo&les and the despising of this world. With such gentle words did he entertain them, and so often in every week did he resort to their company, that many of these men were converted thereby to good cuftoms and habits, which they forsook not for the derision of the people.

3. The Canon went daily through the streets of that city, taking note of those that worked at their trades therein, namely, the drapers, shoe makers, furriers, blacksmiths, butchers and those that followed other trades; and, when he knew that any of them affed falsely in his profession, he reproached him immediately, and reproved him in such manner that he made the thing known to all those that were in the ffreets; wherefore all that traded in that city had both fear and respefl for him, and many of them had ill-will towards him; but for fear of him all these men ceased from a fling craftily in their business.

4. It came to pass one day that in the quarter of the drapers, while the drapers had gone to dine, the Canon came with a great multitude of loose-living men1 ; and climbing up to the shutters which the drapers place over their doors that there may be darkness in the shops, to the end that none may see clearly the quality of their cloth, they cut and tore in pieces and destroyed all those shutters and all the blinds which prevent men from seeing the cloth which is shown to them. When the drapers returned from dining, they found the Canon and his companions at this work of deflruflion in their shops. Great was the strife between them, and on either side were evil words spoken ; and the Canon and his companions cried, “ Juftice 1 Justice 1 ” Then the drapers went to the Court and made complaint concerning the Canon and his companions, The bailiff and the judge of the city reproved and re¬ proached the Canon and his companions very severely, and blamed the Canon because he went about in the com-

1 Lit. ab gran re Jt tafxn e d arhll .

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pany of men so vile. Now in the Court was the Canon of Mercy, who had come to support the argument of his comrade, and he spake these words : “ The Canon of Per¬ secution labours for the sake of juftice, the which juftice he demands; and he commands that the light of the sun, which God gives for the eyes, wherewith it is His will that men may see, be not taken from the shops by the false drapers who deceive those men that buy cloth of them. These gamblers and harlots conceal not their vices, but make them manifest to all; the drapers conceal that which juftice commands shall be shown; wherefore the drapers are viler people than the gamblers, inasmuch as they are the more opposed to juftice.” When the Canon of Mercy had spoken these words, the gamblers and the Canon of Persecution cried in a loud voice: “ Wrong, wrong is in the King, who in his Court has not a bailiff or a judge that is a lover and a server of juftice.” Even to the King went the Canon and his comrades, crying, “ Wrong 1 wrong 1 ” And they made complaint againft the judge and the bailiff and the drapers, and the King made an ordinance that from that time forward there should be nothing placed before any shop in the quarters of the drapers which should keep the light from those that desired in that place to buy cloth.

S ■ A certain knight died in that city, and, as they bore him to the church for burial, his wife and his kinsfolk, clothed in black, accompanied the body, and wept very bitterly and made great ado, tearing their hair and pluck¬ ing at their faces and their clothing. Upon a great horse fully apparelled there rode a squire in armour, weeping and wailing for the death of his lord, and bearing his arms reversed. The Canon of Persecution met the body, and he perceived that, in respeft of those that wept, the will of our Lord God was dishonoured, since it was He that had desired that the knight should pass from this world. The Canon saw that he muft needs ftrive for the sake of 302

OF PERSECUTION

juftice, and he went to the Canon of Poverty and to the Canon of Tears, begging them to help him to cause the honour to be done which it behoves man to pay to the will of God. So all these three canons went to the Prince and to the Bishop, and laid these words before them :

6. “ Lords ! ” said the Canon of Persecution, “ In both of you is represented the Divine dominion. I beg you, then, to give me sentence, whether these persons that weep for the knight whom God has willed to slay do not dis¬ honour to the will of God ; and if juft sentence be given that God is offended by them, I beg that satisfaction be made, to the end that no persons henceforward may accom¬ pany a corpse weeping or giving signs of sadness concerning that which is willed by the Divine Will, nor through their tears impede the Divine Office of the Mass.” After this spake the Canon of Tears, saying that it is meet to weep that there may result therefrom contrition and devotion. “ But,” said he, “ they that follow this corpse weep through vainglory and hypocrisy, wherefore their tears are opposed to the will of God, and for this cause I cry out upon them for that they do dishonour to the office which is commended to me in weeping for an unlawful cause.” The Canon of Poverty spake likewise, and said that the money which was spent upon garments of mourning was ftolen from the poor, and from the soul of the man de¬ ceased, and that therefore he desired to recover it, and that thenceforward that which would have been spent upon garments of mourning should be given to the poor, and that no man for the death of another should be garbed in mourning. The Prince and the Bishop took counsel with the notables of the city concerning the words which were spoken to them by the three canons, and they desired that constitution according to the will of the canons should be made for all time in that city upon the matters aforesaid.

7. At that time, after the feaft of the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Chrift, it came to pass that the Archdeacon

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desired to sing his firfl Mass.1 Great was the concourse and the assembly of many persons who had come from distant lands to do honour to the Archdeacon. When the Archdeacon had entered the church with great pomp and pride, and was about to begin the Mass, the Canon of Persecution cried in a loud voice, saying: “ How simple was Jesus Chrift, Who in His great humility desired to be born in the lowlieft poverty 1 And behold, the Archdeacon prepares great pomp and solemnity for his Mass, and in this wise with pride and vainglory endeavours to be like to Jesus Chrift 1 ”

8. When the Canon cried out thus, the people rebuked him and threatened him; but none the less the Canon continued to cry for so long as he might concerning the folly which the Archdeacon committed, saying that it was a thing ill-beseeming that any man who had within him the devil of vainglory should sing Mass. Wherefore the Canon of Tears wept likewise for the dishonour which was done to the Mass, and the Bishop preached, that he might make peace between humility and the Archdeacon. And the Canon of Purity rebuked the Bishop who gave the Archdeacon permission to begin with pride that office which is the nobleft and the holieA and the humbleft that may be; and he rebuked the King who had come to the Mass, which was dishonoured by all such as had come to it.

9. In the month of April there was a great lack of rain in that country whither the Canon of Persecution had gone to preach; and the Bishop, with many of the clergy, and many religious men, made procession in honour of God, that He might give rain, for otherwise the wheat would be defrayed. The Canon, in the likeness of a fool, which he had oftentimes been accuftomed to take, went through the town speaking certain foolish words, to the end that thereby

1 Uau Novella, i.e. the first Mass to be sung by him after his ordination to the priesthood. The Archdeacon would not necessarily be a priest at the time of his appointment to his office.

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will pray to God for rain, how comes it that there are not so many, even in all the world, who will go to unbelievers to preach the Trinity and Incarnation and Passion of the Son of God ? ” Loudly did the Canon cry out these words, and for none would he be silent, and two clerks ftruck him and beat him sorely by reason of the words which he spake ; and the more they beat him the more did he call upon justice to aid him for that he served her.

io. After the procession it came to pass that a thief was being led out to be hanged. The Canon enquired of those that led him wherefore they were about to hang him, and they answered and said that that man was a great gambler and a great thief ; and he enquired of the man if that which they spake were true, and he answered that he had been a thief in that he cheated at dicing. Whereupon the Canon said that the King, rather than the thief, should be hanged, and upon a gibbet that was higher. All they that were in the household of the King were greatly displeased because

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of dice, had become a thief. And when a Prince who is the occasion of wrong-doing hangs them that do that which he allows, he himself should be hanged rather than they that do wrong through him. For a great space did the King consider the words which the fool had spoken, and he said that the fool had changed his likeness and had taken the likeness of a fool that thereby he might make others wise; so he commanded that honour should be done to him, and that from thenceforward an ordinance and cuftom should be made that in that country there should be no more games of dice.

ii. It came to pass one day that the Canon was leaving the city and going to another city, and he found upon the way a great multitude of men who came from Santiago and were clothed after the likeness of the Apoftles. The Canon enquired of them of what Order they were, and they answered him saying that they were of the Order of the Apoflles; and the Canon replied that his office and the name of their Order agreed the one with the other. The friars who named themselves of the Order of the Apoftles begged him to expound to them the agreement whereof he spake, and the Canon said that one that is an Apoftle should be persecuted unrighteously; wherefore, if they desired to be in the Order of the Apoftles, it behoved them to preach the word of God in the cities and the towns and the ca&les and the villages through the which they would pass, and to reproach men for sins which they saw com¬ mitted, and fear neither trials nor death, but go to preach the Catholic Faith to unbelievers, that they might be more like to the ApoStles thereby. Even so went the Canon through every land, and he reproved all such as did not their duty in their office, and he was persecuted and tor¬ mented many times by those whom he reproved, but through his merits God did much good in all those countries where the Canon journeyed and sojourned, for, as the trials and the persecutions of the Canon were increased so like- 306

OF QUODLIBETS wise God increased in the people through the merits of the Canon His virtues and His grace.