The Story of Siena and San Gimignano. Gardner Edmund G.
book known as the Leggenda minore; and, a little later, the famous Frate Raimondo delle Vigne da Capua, a strenuous labourer in God’s vineyard and a man of apostolic spirit, who succeeded Frate Tommaso della Fonte as her confessor, and wrote the famous life of her, the Leggenda, of which Caffarini’s book is in the main an abridgement. There were devout women too, who robed themselves in the same black and white habit of penance, some of them from the noblest families of Siena: Alessia Saracini and Francesca Gori, the two whom we see with her in Bazzi’s frescoes; several of the Tolomei; and, later, Lisa, the widow of Catherine’s brother Bartolommeo. Presently there were added to these several young men of noble birth, who acted as her secretaries and legates, united to her by what seems a wonderful blending of religious enthusiasm and spiritualised affection: Neri di Landoccio de’ Pagliaresi, a scholar and poet; Francesco Malavolti, a somewhat unstable youth who at first relapsed at times into his former worldly life, and whom she recalled to herself in one of her sweetest and most affectionate epistles, addressing him as “carissimo e sopracarissimo figliuolo in Cristo dolce Gesù;” Stefano Maconi, who headed a furious feud of his family against the Tolomei and Rinaldini, until converted by her to be the most beloved son of all her spiritual family, and ultimately the sainted prior of the Certosa of Pavia.
One famous episode of this epoch in her life has been perpetuated in a letter of Catherine’s own, that is one of the masterpieces of Italian literature, and in a famous fresco of Bazzi’s. A young nobleman of Perugia, Niccolò di Toldo, attached to the household of the Senator of Siena, was sentenced to be beheaded for some rash words against the government of the Riformatori. In his prison he abandoned himself to desperation and despair – he was a mere youth, thus doomed to death in the flower of his age – refused to see priest or friar, would make no preparation for his end. Then Catherine came to him in his dungeon. Let her own words that she wrote to Frate Raimondo tell what followed: —
“I went to visit him of whom you know; whereby he received so great comfort and consolation that he confessed and disposed himself right well. And he made me promise by the love of God that, when the time for the execution came, I would be with him. And so I promised and did. Then, in the morning, before the bell tolled, I went to him; and he received great consolation. I took him to hear Mass; and he received the Holy Communion, which he had never received again.20 His will was attuned and subjected to the will of God; and there alone remained a fear of not being brave at the last moment. But the boundless and flaming bounty of God passed his expectation, creating in him so great affection and love in the desire of God, that he could not stay without Him, saying: ‘Stay with me, and do not leave me. So shall I fare not otherwise than well; and I die content.’ And he laid his head upon my breast. Then I felt an exultation and an odour of his blood and of mine too, which I desired to shed for the sweet spouse Jesus. And as the desire increased in my soul and I felt his fear, I said: ‘Take comfort, my sweet brother; for soon shall we come to the nuptials. Thither shalt thou go, bathed in the sweet blood of the Son of God, with the sweet name of Jesus, the which I would not that it ever leave thy memory. And I am waiting for thee at the place of execution.’ Now, think, father and son, that his heart then lost all fear, and his face was transformed from sadness into joy; and he rejoiced, exulted and said: ‘Whence cometh to me so great grace, that the sweetness of my soul will await me at the holy place of execution?’ See how he had come to such light that he called the place of execution holy! And he said, ‘I shall go all joyous and strong; and it will seem to me a thousand years before I come there, when I think that you are awaiting me there.’ And he uttered words of such sweetness of the bounty of God, that one might scarce endure it.”
She waited for him at the place of execution, with continual prayer, in the spiritual presence of Mary and of the virgin martyr Catherine. She knelt down and laid her own head upon the block, either dreaming of martyrdom or to make herself one in spirit with him at the dread moment. She besought Mary to give him light and peace of heart, and that she herself might see him return to God. Her soul, she says, was so full that, although there was a multitude of the people there, she could not see a creature.
“Then he came, like a meek lamb; and, when he saw me, he began to smile; and he would have me make the sign of the Cross over him. When he had received the sign, I said: ‘Up to the nuptials, sweet brother mine! for soon shalt thou be in the eternal life.’ He placed himself down with great meekness; and I stretched out his neck and bent down over him, and reminded him of the Blood of the Lamb. His mouth said nought, save Jesus and Catherine. And, as he spoke so, I received his head into my hands, fixing my eyes upon the Divine Goodness and saying, ‘I am willing.’”
As she knelt with the severed head in her hands, her white robe all crimsoned over with his blood, Catherine had one of those mystical visions which she can only tell in terms of blood and fire. She saw the soul received by its Maker, and saw it, in the first tasting of the divine sweetness, turn back to thank her. “Then did my soul repose in peace and in quiet, in so great an odour of blood, that I could not bear to free myself from the blood that had come upon me from him. Alas! wretched miserable woman that I am, I will say no more. I remained upon the earth with very great envy.”21
Gradually we find Catherine becoming a power in her own city, a factor in the turbulent politics of Italy, a counsellor in what a sixteenth century Pope was to call the Game of the World. She dictates epistles, full of wise counsels, to the rulers of the Republic – to her “dearest brothers and temporal lords,” the Fifteen, Lords Defenders of the city of Siena, to her “most reverend and most dear father and son” the Podestà, or to her “dearest brother in Christ sweet Jesus,” the Senator. At Rocca d’Orcia – the chief fortress of the Salimbeni – she reconciles the rival branches of that great clan with each other, makes peace between the head of the House, her friend Agnolino (the son of the great Giovanni di Agnolino Salimbeni) and his factious kinsman Cione. While staying at the Rocca, she appears to have learnt to write – it is said by a miracle.22 Be that as it may, the greater part at least of her extant letters (and, so far as the knowledge of the present writer extends, all those of which the original autographs have been preserved), were dictated to her secretaries. We possess nearly four hundred of them, these epistles “al nome di Gesù Cristo crocifisso e di Maria dolce,” written – to use her own phrase – “in the precious blood of Christ” to persons of both sexes, and of every condition of life from the King of France and the Roman Pontiff to a humble Florentine tailor, from the Queens of Naples and Hungary to a courtesan in Perugia. Her philosophy is simple, but profound: strip yourself of self-love, enter into the Cell of Self-Knowledge – that is the key to it. And all alike, in appearance at least, pause to listen to her inspired voice, bow before her virginal will.
There is grim war preparing between Pope Gregory XI., in his luxurious exile at Avignon, and the tyrant of Milan, Bernabò Visconti. To the Cardinal Legate of Bologna, who is to direct the campaign, she writes: “Strive to the utmost of your power to bring about the peace and the union of all the country. And in this holy work, if it were necessary to give up the life of the body, it should be given a thousand times, if it were possible. Peace, peace, peace, dearest father! Do you and the others consider, and make the Holy Father think of the loss of souls rather than the loss of cities; for God requires souls rather than cities.”23 Bernabò and his wife Beatrice each send ambassadors on their own account to gain her ear. To the tyrant she writes of the law of love, of the vanity of earthly lordship in comparison with the lordship of the city of the soul, of the necessity of submission to the Head of the Church, “the Vicar who holds the keys of the blood of Christ crucified.”24 She bids the proud lady of Lombardy robe herself with the robe of burning Charity and make herself the means and instrument to reconcile her husband “with Christ sweet Jesus, and with His Vicar, Christ on earth.”25 Her prayers are effectual, and a truce is proclaimed. The Vicar Apostolic in the Papal States writes to her for counsel in the name of the Pope. She bids him destroy the nepotism and luxury that are ruining the Church. Better than labouring for the temporalities of the Church would it be to strive to put down “the wolves and incarnate demons of pastors, who attend to nought else
Letter 273.
Letter 272.
Letter 11.
Letter 28.
Letter 29.