“However, in this case the proverb got the lie, for the lady after she was married behaved with great propriety, and yet was often reminded that she had better have repented before she sinned than after; for many would not speak to her, for all her wealth, till she was well convinced that Che profitta ravedersi dopo il fatto?
“‘When the deed has once been done,
What is the use of repenting, my son?’
“So it befell one morning that the poor soul was praying in the Cathedral or Duomo, as many another poor sinner had done before her (doubtless on the same spot), when a noble lady, who had never been found out in any naughtiness (some people are certainly very lucky in this world, Signore Carlo!), came by, and seeing the penitent, drew in her robe, turned up her nose, and retreated as if the other had the plague. To which the Magdalen replied, in a sad but firm voice, ‘Madonna,
you need not be afraid to touch me, for I assure you that the malady (of which I have, I trust, been thoroughly cured) attacks none save those who wish to have it.’”
When standing in the Cathedral, the visitor may remember that here Santo Crescenzio, who died in 424, once wrought a miracle, thus recorded in his “Life” of the fourteenth century:
“A poor man had come into the Cathedral and saw no light (i.e., was blind), and going to where Saint Crescentius was, implored him with great piety that he would cause the light to return unto him. And being moved to pity, he made the sign of the cross in the eyes of the blind man, and incontinently the light was restored unto him. Saint Crescentius did not wish this to be made known, and pretended to know nothing about it, but he could not conceal such miracles.”
Of which the immortal Flaxius remarks, that “it is singular that so many saints who wished to keep their miracles unknown had not the forethought to make silence a condition of cure. Also, that of all the wonder-working once effected by the holy men of the Church, the only gift now remaining to them is the miraculous power of changing sons and daughters into nephews and nieces; the which, as I am assured, is still as flourishing as ever, and permitted as a proof of transubstantiation.” Thus it is that simple heretics deride holy men. And Flaxius is, I bid ye note, a sinner, in whose antique, unsanctified derision I most assuredly do take no part, “it being in bad form in this our age to believe or disbelieve in anything,” and therefore in bad style to laugh at aught.
It may be worth recalling, when looking out on the Cathedral Square, that it was here that San Zenobio performed another great miracle, recorded in all his lives, but most briefly in the poetical one:
“Then did he raise an orphan from the dead,
The only son of a poor widow, he,
A cart with oxen passing o’er his head,
Died in the Duomo Square in misery;
But though all crushed, the Saint restored his life,
And, well and gay and bright as stars do shine,
He went to his mother, and the pious wife
Gave thanks to God for mercy all divine.”
Which being witnessed, says the Vita San Zenobii, all who were present began to sing, “Gloria tibi Domine qui mirabilia per servos tuos in nobis operari dignatus es, gloria sit tibi-i et laus in sæcu-la—sec-u-lo-o-o-rum, A-men.