In the case of the sick, treatment varied. Some would not "console" anyone not in full possession of his faculties and able to make the answers. Others admitted such, provided that in some way other than by speech he signified his assent. Others went further and "consoled" even the unconscious at the urgent request of his friends anxious for his eternal welfare. Thus sometimes even children were "consoled." In these cases certain modifications were allowed in the ritual. Thus if the sick man could not make his melioramentum, the minister took his hands within his own, and the sick man would say "Benedicite," bending his head each time. If he could not say the Lord's Prayer, others would say it for him. If it were discovered that the officiating minister was in mortal sin (according to Catharist law), the Consolamentum was invalid.
§ 4. THE ENDURA
Every inducement was now made to the sick man to end his life by any means other than by direct violence. He was urged to undergo the Endura, which took various forms. We read of this as early as A.D. 1028 in connection with a community at Montfort, near Turin, which taught that death by illness or senile decay only shewed that Satan was still master of the situation and could send the soul into another body. Here probably we have the clue to the reasons for encouraging the practice of the Endura. The "consoled" had solemnly promised not to kill, and therefore could not directly commit suicide. But he could consummate the purpose of God, Who had sent him the illness, by indirect means, and thwart the world, the flesh and the devil by a speedy death. Several expedients were adopted. Thus the "consoled" sick was asked whether he would be a martyr or a confessor. If he said the former, a cushion or pillow was held over his mouth for some time. Whether he recovered or succumbed, he was henceforth held to be a martyr. If he said, a confessor, he had to remain three days without food and drink, and whether the fast proved fatal or not, he was called a confessor. At Ax, Peter Autéri, after some hesitation, "consoled" an unconscious woman, and ordered that nothing should be given her but pure water. She recovered and asked for food, which, however, her daughter refused on religious grounds, but the mother indignantly declined to be bound by promises made for her by others. Mengard, a woman examined at Carcassonne in A.D. 1308, said her little boy was hereticated when at the point of death, and she was ordered to give him nothing but bread and water, for when he died he would be an angel. But she refused not to give him the breast, and so he was not fully hereticated. At the same Inquisition Raymond Issaun said that his brother, William, after heretication had placed himself completely in the Endura for about seven weeks, and stayed in a certain hut where he died, and he was buried in the house of their father. Another method was opening a vein and slowly bleeding to death in a bath; another, drinking the juice of wild cucumbers mixed with powdered glass so that the intestines were torn to pieces.
§ 5. PENANCE
This was administered by the Major, or by a Presbyter by delegation in minor offences. After the penitent had confessed, the Major (or Presbyter) pointed out how and to what extent he had offended against the Holy Scriptures, and imposed a penance accordingly, saying: "I, being entrusted with the authority of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, bid thee on behalf of our Lord Jesus Christ Who instituted this holy sacrament of penance in His Church, perform such penance as I impose upon thee."[72] No indulgences were granted. Absolution was from the fault, not from its punishment.
§ 6. FASTS
"The Manichees of modern times," as they are called in the Acts of the Inquisition at Carcassonne, had three Fasts of forty days during the year, (a) From St. Britius (Nov. 13th) to Christmas. (b) Lent. (c) From Whitsun to SS. Peter and Paul (June 29th), which, therefore, could not always have been forty days. The first and last week of each Fast they called "strict," for then they fasted on bread and water, but in the other weeks of the Fast on only three days—Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Others observed these three days as Fasts throughout the year, unless they were travelling or were ill. Others, again, because flesh was repulsive to them, and to mark their difference from the Roman Church, would eat flesh on Roman Fast days, but not when their own and Roman Fasts coincided.
[68] Cod. Vat. 4030.
[69] v. pp. 47, note, 62.
[70] Also, more rarely, la Convenenza or the Agreement.