'The holy lady Francisca Romana valued such quietude above all things else; wherefore one day, while she was devoutly, as was her wont, reading the history of our blessed Lady, being called away by her husband to perform some domestic duty, she laid aside her book, leaving the verse she was reading, unfinished, and having fulfilled her lord's commands, hastened back to her devotions, when lo! the verse at which she had broken off had been changed by an angel into letters of gold.'
The necessity of holding the rod over children, he thus illustrates:
'So long as Aaron, at Pharaoh's court, held the rod in his hand, it remained a rod; but when he cast it on the ground, it became a serpent. Remember this, ye parents! and cast it not away.'
Next comes the turn of the rich man, at whom our worthy apostle hammers away without mercy:
'MARK—RICH MAN!'
'If it were allowed to Samson to propound a riddle for the delectation of his guests, it will perhaps be not ill taken in me to question my hearers as follows: What is it? It hath not feet, yet travelleth through the whole world; it hath no hands, yet overmasters whole armies; it hath no tongue, yet discourseth more eloquently than Bartolus or Baldus; it hath no sense, yet is more mighty than all the wise men of the earth: 'tis a thing which, both in its German and Latin names, comes near to God. Well now what is it? Crack me this nut, if you can. It is nothing else than Gold. Take away the L from it, and we have God, and in Latin numen is God, and nummus money, which two names are near akin.
'In the days of Noah, when the weary waters were deluging the world, the patriarch sent forth a dove to see how the rains stood upon the earth. This pious and simple bird, more obedient than the raven, returned speedily, and lighted on the ark. After a time, he sent her forth again, and she returned with an olive branch in her mouth; and here the holy book doth not say that Noah this time laid hands on her, and took her into the ark; whence it is reasonable to conclude that she flew in the second time of her own accord, wherein lies no small mystery. The first time, Noah was obliged to draw her into the ark by force, the second time she flew freely in. Reason: the first time, the dovelet had nothing; the dovelet was a poor devil, and durst not venture into the ark,
Si nihil attuleris, ibis, Homere, foras.
The second time, it had an olive branch, and flew straight in, well knowing that door and portal stand open to him that bringeth any thing.'
'Here can I not omit to berate the miser a little. Dearest reader! thou hast doubtless seen somewhat beyond the hedge of thy father's garden, and wandered through many provinces and regions; tell me then, if thou hast ever seen a living purse of money? Such a rarity you have scarcely encountered. But lo! in Matthew, xvii. 23, it is described, how our blessed Lord and his disciples arrived at Capernaum, and the tax-money was demanded of them, and as neither our Lord nor Peter had any silver, he ordered the apostle to cast into the sea, and in the mouth of the first fish he caught he would find money—as indeed it happened, and thus the fish's mouth became a living purse. It is with misers as with this fish; they have nothing but gold in their mouths. They snap at gold, they talk of gold, they fight for gold, they sing of gold, they praise gold, they sigh for gold, they forget not gold, even on their death-bed. Yea, we have an instance in that bold scoffer, who, when the priest visited him in his last hour with the solemn rites of the church, said to him: 'Sir parson, I need not what the cup contains, but if you would have me loan you money on the golden cup itself, I am at your service;' and with these wicked words, gave up the ghost. So that we see that gold, gold is the miser's only thought. O ye fools! ye toil and ye moil, ye chase and ye race, ye sweat and ye fret, ye hurry and ye worry, ye wear and ye tear—and all for gold! Ye drink not, ye eat not, ye sleep not—for gold; till your eyes sink in your head like two hollow nut-shells, till your cheeks are pale as a lawyer's parchment, your hair ragged as a plundered swallow's nest, your legs covered only with skin, like an old drum-head!'
After despatching the misers in this style, he draws to a conclusion, and apostrophizes the world at large, telling them that all their misfortunes arise from sin, a text which he illustrates in this wise:
'I seem to see in fancy holy Bachomius in the wilderness, where he chose him a dwelling among hollow clefts of rocks, which abode consisted in nought but four crooked posts, with a transparent covering of dried boughs. And he, when wearied with singing psalms, resorting to labor lest the old serpent should catch him unemployed, and weaving rude coverings of thatch, sits by a rock, wherefrom flow forth silver veins of water, which make a pleasing murmur in their crystal descent, while around him on the green boughs play the birds of the forest, who with their natural cadences, and the clear-sounding flutes of their throats joining pleno choro, transform the wood into a concert; and the agile deer, the bleating hares, the chirping insects, are his constant companions, unharmed and unharming, all which furnishes him with solace and contentment. But it seemeth to me that our devout hermit delighteth himself more especially in the echo which sends him back his loud sighs and petitions, as when the holy anchorite cries, 'O merciful Christ!' the echo, that unembodied thief, steals away the words, and returns them back to him. But is he too sorely tempted, and doth he exclaim, in holy impatience, 'O thou accursed devil!' the echo lays aside its devout language and sounds back to him, 'Thou accursed devil!' In a word, as a man treats Echo so does Echo treat him.
'Now God is just like this voice of the woods. For it is an unquestioned truth, that as we demean ourselves toward God, so he demeaneth himself toward us.'
In the opinion of our author, and he is not singular in it, procrastination is the great foe to piety and repentance:
'By permission of the Almighty, I knock at the door of hell, and ask this or that one the reason of his condemnation. Holla! thou who art boiling in red hot iron, like a pea in a hot kettle, what was the cause of thy condemnation? 'I,' said he, 'was given to wild lusts, but resolved to leave off my wicked life, and repent, but was suddenly cut off, so that procrastination caused my eternal death.
'The same answer I received from a hundred thousand wretched sinners. Oh how true is it, as the poet says:
'The raven cras oft closes the pass
Unto our souls' salvation;
The fatal 'to-morrow' produceth sorrow,
And final condemnation.''And even, silly souls, if you are not cut off by sudden death, but have time to repent given you on your death-bed, still such late repentance seldom availeth much in the sight of God; as Saint Augustine saith, 'The repentance of a sick man, I fear, is generally sickly; that of a dying man, generally dies away. For when thou canst sin no longer, it is not that thou desertest sin, but that sin deserts thee.'
'God in the Old Testament has admitted all kinds of beasts as acceptable offerings; but he excludeth the swan alone, though the swan with its white vesture agreeth well with the livery of the angels, because this feathered creature is the image of a sinner who puts off repentance till death; for the swan is silent through his whole life, and doth not sing till his life is at its close.
'When Eve let herself be led astray so foolishly by the serpent, God reproved the malice of the enemy with the words: 'Thou shalt bruise the heel of Eve and her seed.' * * * Why then is it said that the serpent shall bruise man's heel? It is here to be observed, that every thing in the Scripture is not to be taken according to the letter, for if so, almost every man would be a cripple; for the Bible telleth us, 'If thy foot offend thee, cut it off.' But often in such words, the Holy Spirit concealeth the profoundest doctrine. So in this passage, as Lorinus wisely expoundeth it, we are not to understand by the heel, the lower part of the human body, but the last hours of man, which Satan pursueth most earnestly.'