THE COMPLAINT OF BOOKS AGAINST THE MENDICANTS
Poor in spirit, but most rich in faith, off-scourings of the world and
salt of the earth, despisers of the world and fishers of men, how happy
are ye, if suffering penury for Christ ye know how to possess your
souls in patience! For it is not want the avenger of iniquity, nor the
adverse fortune of your parents, nor violent necessity that has thus
oppressed you with beggary, but a devout will and Christ-like election,
by which ye have chosen that life as the best, which God Almighty made
man as well by word as by example declared to be the best. In truth,
ye are the latest offspring of the ever-fruitful Church, of late
divinely substituted for the Fathers and the Prophets, that your sound
may go forth into all the earth, and that instructed by our healthful
doctrines ye may preach before all kings and nations the invincible
faith of Christ. Moreover, that the faith of the Fathers is chiefly
enshrined in books the second chapter has sufficiently shown, from
which it is clearer than light that ye ought to be zealous lovers of
books above all other Christians. Ye are commanded to sow upon all
waters, because the Most High is no respecter of persons, nor does the
Most Holy desire the death of sinners, who offered Himself to die for
them, but desires to heal the contrite in heart, to raise the fallen,
and to correct the perverse in the spirit of lenity. For which most
salutary purpose our kindly Mother Church has planted you freely, and
having planted has watered you with favours, and having watered you has
established you with privileges, that ye may be co-workers with pastors
and curates in procuring the salvation of faithful souls. Wherefore,
that the order of Preachers was principally instituted for the study of
the Holy Scriptures and the salvation of their neighbours, is declared
by their constitutions, so that not only from the rule of Bishop
Augustine, which directs books to be asked for every day, but as soon
as they have read the prologue of the said constitutions they may know
from the very title of the same that they are pledged to the love of
books.
But alas! a threefold care of superfluities, viz., of the stomach, of
dress, and of houses, has seduced these men and others following their
example from the paternal care of books, and from their study. For,
forgetting the providence of the Saviour (who is declared by the
Psalmist to think upon the poor and needy), they are occupied with the
wants of the perishing body, that their feasts may be splendid and
their garments luxurious, against the rule, and the fabrics of their
buildings, like the battlements of castles, carried to a height
incompatible with poverty. Because of these three things, we books,
who have ever procured their advancement and have granted them to sit
among the powerful and noble, are put far from their heart's affection
and are reckoned as superfluities; except that they rely upon some
treatises of small value, from which they derive strange heresies and
apocryphal imbecilities, not for the refreshment of souls, but rather
for tickling the ears of the listeners. The Holy Scripture is not
expounded, but is neglected and treated as though it were commonplace
and known to all, though very few have touched its hem, and though its
depth is such, as Holy Augustine declares, that it cannot be understood
by the human intellect, however long it may toil with the utmost
intensity of study. From this he who devotes himself to it
assiduously, if only He will vouchsafe to open the door who has
established the spirit of piety, may unfold a thousand lessons of moral
teaching, which will flourish with the freshest novelty and will
cherish the intelligence of the listeners with the most delightful
savours. Wherefore the first professors of evangelical poverty, after
some slight homage paid to secular science, collecting all their force
of intellect, devoted themselves to labours upon the sacred scripture,
meditating day and night on the law of the Lord. And whatever they
could steal from their famishing belly, or intercept from their
half-covered body, they thought it the highest gain to spend in buying
or correcting books. Whose worldly contemporaries observing their
devotion and study bestowed upon them for the edification of the whole
Church the books which they had collected at great expense in the
various parts of the world.
In truth, in these days as ye are engaged with all diligence in pursuit
of gain, it may be reasonably believed, if we speak according to human
notions, that God thinks less upon those whom He perceives to distrust
His promises, putting their hope in human providence, not considering
the raven, nor the lilies, whom the Most High feeds and arrays. Ye do
not think upon Daniel and the bearer of the mess of boiled pottage, nor
recollect Elijah who was delivered from hunger once in the desert by
angels, again in the torrent by ravens, and again in Sarepta by the
widow, through the divine bounty, which gives to all flesh their meat
in due season. Ye descend (as we fear) by a wretched anticlimax,
distrust of the divine goodness producing reliance upon your own
prudence, and reliance upon your own prudence begetting anxiety about
worldly things, and excessive anxiety about worldly things taking away
the love as well as the study of books; and thus poverty in these days
is abused to the injury of the Word of God, which ye have chosen only
for profit's sake.
With summer fruit, as the people gossip, ye attract boys to religion,
whom when they have taken the vows ye do not instruct by fear and
force, as their age requires, but allow them to devote themselves to
begging expeditions, and suffer them to spend the time, in which they
might be learning, in procuring the favour of friends, to the annoyance
of their parents, the danger of the boys, and the detriment of the
order. And thus no doubt it happens that those who were not compelled
to learn as unwilling boys, when they grow up presume to teach though
utterly unworthy and unlearned, and a small error in the beginning
becomes a very great one in the end. For there grows up among your
promiscuous flock of laity a pestilent multitude of creatures, who
nevertheless the more shamelessly force themselves into the office of
preaching, the less they understand what they are saying, to the
contempt of the Divine Word and the injury of souls. In truth, against
the law ye plough with an ox and an ass together, in committing the
cultivation of the Lord's field to learned and unlearned. Side by
side, it is written, the oxen were ploughing and the asses feeding
beside them: since it is the duty of the discreet to preach, but of the
simple to feed themselves in silence by the hearing of sacred
eloquence. How many stones ye fling upon the heap of Mercury nowadays!
How many marriages ye procure for the eunuchs of wisdom! How many
blind watchmen ye bid go round about the walls of the Church!
O idle fishermen, using only the nets of others, which when torn it is
all ye can do to clumsily repair, but can net no new ones of your own!
ye enter on the labours of others, ye repeat the lessons of others, ye
mouth with theatric effort the superficially repeated wisdom of others.
As the silly parrot imitates the words that he has heard, so such men
are mere reciters of all, but authors of nothing, imitating Balaam's
ass, which, though senseless of itself, yet became eloquent of speech
and the teacher of its master though a prophet. Recover yourselves, O
poor in Christ, and studiously regard us books, without which ye can
never be properly shod in the preparation of the Gospel of Peace.
Paul the Apostle, preacher of the truth and excellent teacher of the
nations, for all his gear bade three things to be brought to him by
Timothy, his cloak, books and parchments, affording an example to
ecclesiastics that they should wear dress in moderation, and should
have books for aid in study, and parchments, which the Apostle
especially esteems, for writing: AND ESPECIALLY, he says, the
parchments. And truly that clerk is crippled and maimed to his
disablement in many ways, who is entirely ignorant of the art of
writing. He beats the air with words and edifies only those who are
present, but does nothing for the absent and for posterity. The man
bore a writer's ink-horn upon his loins, who set a mark Tau upon the
foreheads of the men that sigh and cry, Ezechiel ix.; teaching in a
figure that if any lack skill in writing, he shall not undertake the
task of preaching repentance.
Finally, in conclusion of the present chapter, books implore of you:
make your young men who though ignorant are apt of intellect apply
themselves to study, furnishing them with necessaries, that ye may
teach them not only goodness but discipline and science, may terrify
them by blows, charm them by blandishments, mollify them by gifts, and
urge them on by painful rigour, so that they may become at once
Socratics in morals and Peripatetics in learning. Yesterday, as it
were at the eleventh hour, the prudent householder introduced you into
his vineyard. Repent of idleness before it is too late: would that
with the cunning steward ye might be ashamed of begging so shamelessly;
for then no doubt ye would devote yourselves more assiduously to us
books and to study.