Being the servitor of all men, I am bound to serve them and to dispense to them the wholesome words of my Master. This is why, seeing I am too weak and ill to visit each one of you in particular, I have resolved to send you my message by this letter, and to offer you the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God, and of the Holy Spirit, which are spirit and life. It would be puerile to expect here new ideas either in fact or form. Francis's appeals are of value only by the spirit which animates them. After having briefly recalled the chief features of the gospel, and urgently recommended the communion, Francis addresses himself in particular to certain categories of hearers, with special counsels. Let the podestas, governors, and those who are placed in authority, exercise their functions with mercy, as they would be judged with mercy by God.... Monks in particular, who have renounced the world, are bound to do more and better than simple Christians, to renounce all that is not necessary to them, and to have in hatred the vices and sins of the body.... They should love their enemies, do good to them who hate them, observe the precepts and counsels of our Redeemer, renounce themselves, and subdue their bodies. And no monk is bound to obedience, if in obeying he would be obliged to commit a fault or a sin.... Let us not be wise and learned according to the flesh, but simple, humble, and pure.... We should never desire to be above others, but rather to be below, and to obey all men. He closes by showing the foolishness of those who set their hearts on the possession of earthly goods, and concludes by the very realistic picture of the death of the wicked. His money, his title, his learning, all that he believed himself to possess, all are taken from him; his relatives and his friends to whom he has given his fortune will come to divide it among themselves, and will end by saying: "Curses on him, for he might have given us more and he has not done it; he might have amassed a larger fortune, and he has done nothing of the kind." The worms will eat his body and the demons will consume his soul, and thus he will lose both soul and body. I, Brother Francis, your little servitor, I beg and conjure you by the love that is in God, ready to kiss your feet, to receive with humility and love these and all other words of our Lord Jesus Christ and to conform your conduct to them. And let those who devoutly receive them and understand them pass them on to others. And if they thus persevere unto the end, may they be blessed by the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.[32]