In that city Curione zealously devoted himself to lecturing; but, being at the same time disgusted with the unmeaning practices of the monks, he gave himself with his whole heart to works of Christian charity. As famine and pestilence were wasting the country, he soon after occupied himself wholly in succoring the poor and the sick; he solicited the donations of the nobility, prevailed on the priests to sell for the relief of the wretched the precious objects which adorned their churches, consoled the dying, and even buried the dead.[818] In the convent, he had appeared to be struggling for faith only; in the midst of the pestilence, he seemed to be living for works only. He remembered that Jesus had come _to serve_, and following his Master’s example, he was eager to console every misery. ‘Christ having become the living root of his soul, had made it a fruitful tree.’ As soon as the scourge abated, every one was eager to testify a proper gratitude to Celio, and the Isacios, one of the best families in the province, gave him the hand of one of their daughters, Margarita Bianca, a young woman of great beauty, who became the faithful and brave companion of his life.[819] [Sidenote: Papal Preachers.] Some time after this, Curione, believing that he had nothing more to fear, and desiring to receive his patrimony, to revisit his native country, and to devote his strength and faith to her service, returned to Piedmont. His hopes were disappointed. Cruel family vexations and clerical persecutions assailed a life that was never free from agitation. He had lost all but one sister, whose husband, learning that he intended claiming his inheritance, determined to ruin him. A Dominican monk was making a great noise by his sermons in a neighboring city.[820] Celio took a book from his library, and went with some friends to hear him. He expected that the monk, according to the custom of his class, would draw a frightful picture of the reformers. Curione knew that the essence of the preaching of the evangelical ministry was Christ, justification by faith in his atoning work, the new life which He imparts, and the new commandments which He gives. According to him, the task of the servant of God, now that all things were made new, was to exalt, not the Church, but the Saviour; and to make known all the preciousness of Christ rather than to stun his hearers by furious declamations against their adversaries. Such were not the opinions entertained at that time—we will not say by the great doctors of the Romish Church, but by the vulgar preachers of the papacy. Laying down as a fundamental principle that _there was no salvation out of the Church_, they naturally believed themselves called to urge the necessity of union—not with Christ, but—with Rome; to extol the beauties of its hierarchy, its worship, and its devout institutions. Instead of feeding the sheep, by giving them the spiritual nourishment of faith, they