As happens, however, in such cases, on the one hand Angelus and Ubertino preached according to doctrine, on the other, great masses of simple people accepted this preaching of theirs and spread through the country, beyond all control. So Italy was invaded by these Fraticelli or Friars of the Poor Life, whom many considered dangerous. At this point it was difficult to distinguish the spiritual masters, who maintained contact with the ecclesiastical authorities, from their simpler followers, who now lived outside the order, begging for alms and existing from day to day by the labor of their hands, holding no property of any kind. And these the populace now called Fraticelli, not unlike the French Beghards, who drew their inspiration from Pierre Olieu.
Celestine V was succeeded by Boniface VIII, and this Pope promptly demonstrated scant indulgence for Spirituals and Fraticelli in general: in the last years of the dying century he signed a bull, Firma cautela, in which with one stroke he condemned bizochi, vagabond mendicants who roamed about at the far edge of the Franciscan order, and the Spirituals themselves, who had left the life of the order and retired to a hermitage.
After the death of Boniface VIII, the Spirituals tried to obtain from certain of his successors, among them Clement V, permission to leave the order peaceably, but the advent of John XXII robbed them of all hope. When he was elected in 1316, he had Angelus Clarenus and the Spirituals of Provence put in chains, and many of those who insisted on conducting a free life were burned at the stake.
John had realized, however, that to destroy the weed of the Fraticelli, he needed to condemn as heretical the idea that Christ and the apostles had not owned any property, either individually or in common; and since the general chapter of the Franciscans in Perugia had held this opinion only a year earlier, in condemning the Fraticelli the Pope condemned the whole order. It would seem strange that a pope should consider perverse the idea that Christ was poor, but advocating the poverty of Christ was clearly a very short step from advocating the poverty of his church, and a poor church would have become weak in comparison to the Emperor. So after that, many Fraticelli, who knew nothing of empire or of Perugia, were burned at the stake.
These thoughts were in my mind as I gazed on the legendary figure of Ubertino. My master introduced me, and the old man stroked my cheek, with a warm, almost burning hand. At the touch of his hand I understood many of the things I had heard about that holy man; I understood the mystic fire that had consumed him from his youth, when he had imagined himself transformed into the penitent Magdalen; and then his intense association with Saint Angela of Foligno, who had initiated him into the adoration of the cross . . .
I studied those features as delicate as those of the sainted woman with whom he had fraternally exchanged profound spiritual thoughts. I sensed he must have been able to assume a far harsher expression when, in 1311, the Council of Vienne had eliminated Franciscan superiors hostile to the Spirituals, but had charged the latter to live in peace within the order; and this champion of renunciation had not accepted the compromise and had fought for the institution of a separate order, based on principles of maximum strictness.
Ubertino had then lost his battle, for in those years John XXII was advocating a crusade against the followers of Pierre Olieu, but Ubertino had not hesitated to defend his friend’s memory against the Pope, and, outdone by his sanctity, John had not dared condemn him (though he then condemned the others). On that occasion, indeed, he offered Ubertino a way of saving himself, pressing him to enter the Cluniac order. Ubertino, skillful in gaining protectors and allies in the papal courts (he himself so apparently disarmed and fragile), had in fact agreed to enter the monastery of Gemblach in Flanders, but I believe he never even went there, and remained in Avignon, under the banner of Cardinal Orsini, to defend the Franciscans’ cause.
Only in recent times (and the rumors I had heard were vague) his star at court had waned, he had had to leave Avignon, and the Pope had him pursued as a heretic who per mundum discurrit vagabundus. Then, it was said, all trace of him was lost. That afternoon I had learned, from the dialogue between William and the abbot, that he was hidden here in this abbey. And now I saw him before me.
“William,” he was saying, “they were on the point of killing me, you know. I had to flee in the dead of night.”
“Who wanted to kill you? John?”
“No. John has never been fond of me, but he has never ceased to respect me. After all, he was the one who offered me a way of avoiding a trial ten years ago, commanding me to enter the Benedictines.”
“Then who wished you ill?”
“All of them. The curia. They tried to assassinate me twice. They tried to silence me. You know what happened five years ago. The Beghards of Narbonne had been condemned two years before, and Berengar Talloni, though he was one of the judges, had appealed to the Pope. Those were difficult moments. John had already issued two bulls against the Spirituals, and even Michael of Cesena had given up—by the way, when does he arrive?”
“He will be here in two days’ time.”
“Michael . . . I have not seen him for so long. Now he has come around, he understands what we wanted, the Perugia chapter asserted that we were right. But then, still in 1318, he gave in to the Pope and turned over to him five Spirituals of Provence who were resisting submission. Burned, William . . . Oh, it is horrible!” He hid his face in his hands.
“But what exactly happened after Talloni’s appeal?” William asked.
“John had to reopen the debate, you understand? He had to do it, because in the curia, too, there were men seized with doubt, even the Franciscans in the curia—pharisees, whited sepulchers, ready to sell themselves for a prebend, but they were seized with doubt. It was then that John asked me to draw up a memorial on poverty. It was a fine work, William, may God forgive my pride. . . .”
“I have read it. Michael showed it to me.”
“There were the hesitant, even among our own men, the Provincial of Aquitaine, the Cardinal of San Vitale, the Bishop of Kaffa. . . .”
“An idiot,” William said.
“Rest in peace. He was gathered to God two years ago.”
“God was not so compassionate. That was a false report that arrived from Constantinople. He is still in our midst, and I am told he will be a member of the legation. God protect us!”
“But he is favorable to the chapter of Perugia,” Ubertino said.
“Exactly. He belongs to that race of men who are always their adversary’s best champions.”
“To tell the truth,” Ubertino said, “even then he was no great help to the cause. And it all came to nothing, but at least the idea was not declared heretical, and this was important. And so the others have never forgiven me. They have tried to harm me in every way, they have said that I was at Sachsenhausen three years ago, when Louis proclaimed John a heretic. And yet they all knew I was in Avignon that July with Orsini. . . . They found that parts of the Emperor’s declaration reflected my ideas. What madness.”
“Not all that mad,” William said. “I had given him the ideas, taking them from your Declaration of Avignon, and from some pages of Olieu.”
“You?” Ubertino exclaimed, between amazement and joy. “But then you agree with me!”
William seemed embarrassed. “They were the right ideas for the Emperor, at that moment,” he said evasively.
Ubertino looked at him suspiciously. “Ah, but you don’t really believe them, do you?”
“Tell me,” William said, “tell me how you saved yourself from those dogs.”
“Ah, dogs indeed, William. Rabid dogs. I found myself even in conflict with Bonagratia, you know?”
“But Bonagratia is on our side!”
“Now he is, after I spoke at length with him. Then he was convinced, and he protested against the Ad conditorem canonum. And the Pope imprisoned him for a year.”
“I have heard he is now close to a friend of mine in the curia, William of Occam.”
“I knew him only slightly. I don’t like him. A man without fervor, all head, no heart.”
“But the head is beautiful.”
“Perhaps, and it will take him to hell.”
“Then I will see him again down there, and we will argue logic.”
“Hush, William,” Ubertino said, smiling with deep affection, “you are better than your philosophers. If only you had wanted . . .”
“What?”
“When we saw each other the last time in Umbria—remember?—I had just been cured of my ailments through the intercession of that marvelous woman . . . Clare of Montefalco . . .” he murmured, his face radiant. “Clare . . . When female nature,
