NOVEL IV.
A young scholar, named Felix, teaches one Puccio how he may be saved, by performing a penance which he shows him: this he puts into execution, and in the meantime Felix amuses himself with his wife.
When Filomena had finished her story, which was much commended by Dioneo, the queen, casting her eyes on Pamfìlo, said: "Continue this amusement by some agreeable story." He replied, that he was very willing, and began thus:
- Some people there are, who, whilst they endeavour to get to heaven themselves, inadvertently send others thither, which was the case of a neighbour of ours, as you shall hear. Near to St. Brancazio, as I am informed, there lived an honest man, and one of good substance, whose name was Puccio di Rineri, who, being spritually (spiritually) minded, and having much converse with the Franciscans, was usually called Friar Puccio.
This man, I say, regarding only his religious affairs, and having no family besides a wife and a maid-servant, used constantly to be at church, spending his whole time in saying Pater Nosters, hearing sermons, and going to masses; and for fasting, and all kinds of holy discipline, he was as devout as the best. What with his devotion, and perhaps his age, his wife, whose name was Isabella, a lady of about twenty-eight years of age, as fresh and fair and plump as an apple, had a great deal more fasting than she thought good for her, and many a time would gladly have been asleep or otherwise employed, when he was recounting to her the holy life of our Lord, the preachings of Father Anastasius, the lamentations of Mary Magdalen, and so forth.
Now at that time there returned from Paris a monk belonging to he convent of St. Brancazio, a comely young man, of good parts and learning, with whom our Puccio contracted an acquaintance; and as he was able to solve all his scruples, and appeared to be very religious, Friar Puccio would frequently invite him to his house, both to dine and sup, whilst his wife shewed him great civility on her husband's account.
Coming often to the house in this manner, he soon cast his eye upon Puccio's wife, and perceiving that he was nowise disagreeable to her, he took the first opportunity of making a discovery of his inclinations; but, though he found her disposed to compliance, he could in no way contrive the means, for she would go nowhere out of her own house, and there it could not be, for Puccio was never far from home, which threw the young monk into a kind of despair. At last it came into his head how the thing might be carried on in the house, without any suspicion, though the husband was there all the time. Being one day alone with Puccio, he began in this manner: "I understand. Brother Puccio, that all your desire is to become holy, but it seems to me as if you took quite a round-about way, whilst there is a much shorter path, which the pope and the other great prelates know and follow, yet they are unwilling it should be divulged, for the sake of the clergy, because they live chiefly on the charities of the people, who in that case would have no further need to give them alms. Now as you are my friend, and have entertained me well at your house, if I thought you would tell nobody, and would practise this way I am speaking of, I would reveal it to you." Puccio was extremely impatient to know the secret swearing, by all that was sacred, never to divulge it without the monk's consent, and promising, if possible, to observe it; "As you make this promise," quoth the other, "I will tell you." "You must understand, then, that the holy doctors of the church maintain, that penance in the manner I am going to lay down, is necessary to saintly beatitude. But take notice, I do not say that, after this penance, you will be no more capable of sinning. No; but all the sins committed before that time will be forgiven, and the sins committed afterwards will not be numbered to your damnation; but you may wash them away with holy water, as now you may do by venial sins. A man, then, must begin this penance by a strict confession of all his sins; after which fasting and abstinence are necessary for forty days; during which space you must refrain, not to say from women only, but even from your own wife. Besides this, you must have some place in your own house where you may look towards heaven all night long. Thither you are to go in the evening, and there you must have a very large table fixed in such a manner, that, as you stand upon your feet, the small of your back may lean upon it, whilst your arms are extended like a crucifix; and if you can make them reach to any peg of wood, so much the better. In this manner you are to gaze towards heaven, without altering your posture till the morning. If you had been a scholar, you should have repeated some prayers which I would have taught you; but as you are not, you must say three hundred Pater Nosters, with as many Ave Marias, in honour of the Trinity; and, fixing your eyes upon heaven, you are still to remember God, the Creator of heaven and earth, and to bear in mind Christ's passion, standing in the manner that he was nailed to the cross; and, when the bell sounds in the morning, you may throw yourself upon your bed to sleep. You must afterwards go to church, and hear three masses at least, and say fifty Pater Nosters, and the like number of Ave Marias; and when this is done, you may go fairly and honestly about any business you may have to do; afterwards get your dinner, and be at church in the evening, where you must say a few prayers which I shall give you in writing, without which all would signify nothing; and in the evening return as before. If you follow this method, as I have formerly done, I hope, before the expiration of your penance, that you will perceive wonderful things of the eternal beatitudes; supposing, at the same time, that you are thoroughly devout."
Friar Puccio replied: "This is no such long and grievous affair, and with God's permission I will begin next Sunday;" and leaving his friend, he went and related the whole to his wife. She knew well enough what the monk meant by that standing still in one spot till the morning, and thinking it a very good plan, she told her husband that she was satisfied with that, or anything else that he should do for the good of his soul; and, to render his penance more effectual, she meant to keep him company with fasting, but with nothing else. So far they were agreed: and when Sunday came, he entered upon his course, whilst the monk came every evening to sup with her, bringing with him plenty of meat and drink, and he stayed with her always till morning, when it was Puccio's time to come to bed.
Now the room he had fixed upon for his penance was next to that where the lady lay, and divided from it only by a very thin partition. One night, when he had just got through a hundred of his Pater Nosters, he heard a noise in the next room; and, making a full stop, he called out to his wife, to know what she was doing. The lady, who was full heartily, as well she might; "have not I heard you say a thousand times that there is no resting in bed with an empty stomach?" Poor Puccio imagined that her not sleeping was really occasioned by her going to bed without her supper, and said to her, in the simplicity of his heart, "I told you, my dear, not to fast; but since you would do it, even try and rest as well as you can: you make the very floor shake under my feet." - "Never mind: attend to what you are about, and I will do as well as I can." Puccio said no more, but resumed his Pater Nosters.
After that night the lady and the monk found out another part of the house, where they diverted themselves as long as the penance lasted. In the morning, when the monk was gone, Isabella used to return to her own bed, before her husband came to lie down. Things continuing in this way during the time that Puccio was qualifying himself for saintship, Isabella often said to the roguish monk, "Is it not a good joke, that you have put Puccio upon a penance by which we have gained paradise?" She liked it, indeed, so well, and was so fond of the good cheer supplied her by the monk, after the long time she had been kept on low diet by her husband, that even when the forty days of penance were out she found means to meet the monk elsewhere, and feast with him without stint. Thus I have made good the truth of what I said at the beginning of my story, for you see that whilst poor Friar Puccio thought of winning paradise by his hard penance, he only opened its doors to his wife and to the monk who had shown him the short cut thither.
