[25] In this terrible picture of Religious life at its lowest ebb, some allowance must be made for the fervid imagination and righteous wrath of the holy writer (“_quidam sanctus doctor hujus sanctae Paupertatis professor et zelator strenuus_”). But even with sloth, gluttony, intemperance, greed of gain, hypocrisy, and ungodliness running riot in a whole Community, it is profitable to the historian to note that there is not a hint of unchastity, the truth being that a Community wholly unchaste is one of those rarities of history sought in the past, and desired, I fear, by certain historians, but scarcely existing outside the cruel inventions of interested despoilers. And lest any be amazed that the Religious life should ever have fallen even half as low as is here portrayed, let them remember that the higher the ideal, the further the fall when it comes, and that the Lady Poverty has ever punished her betrayers by the completest degradation. [26] “Terribilis ut castrorum acies ordinata.” This occurs in the Chapter at Prime in the Office of Our Lady, and hence it is here used in connection with that other Lady, Madonna Povertà. The translator of the “Meditazione,” finding it would have no associations in Italian (as of course it has none in English), quietly drops it, but I cannot take so great a liberty, nor allow myself to hide the vivid and touching imagination which the pious author thus betrays. Throughout the whole allegory the influence of the Liturgy is conspicuous. [27] Regula S. Francisci, Cap. vi. [28] “Non habebat aliud Christi pauper nisi duo minuta, corpus scilicet, et animam, quod posset liberali charitate largiri.” Leg. Maj. S. Bonav., Cap. ix. [29] Romans viii. 28. [30] Testament of St Francis. [31] “Fioretti,” chap. xiii. [32] _Vide_ “The Parable of Poverty,” Legenda III. Soc. Cap. xii., Bollandist Edition. [33] Matthew v. 3. [34] “Parochial Sermons”: _The Danger of Riches_. [35] Scartazzini rejects the reading “salse” (“lezione priva di autorità”), and adopts “pianse.” I hope, for the sake of Dante’s great imagination, that he may be in the wrong. So competent an authority as Mr Wicksteed adheres to “salse,” basing his reason on this very prayer. See the “Paradise” of Dante Alighieri, translated by Philip H. Wicksteed, Dent, 1899.