Falling on his knees, Clement continued:--"Lord, Lord, be gracious unto me! lay thy words upon my tongue, make me worthy to feel the love of the seraphs; pour out thy goodness richly over the brother of my heart; crush him; let him feel the swords which have pierced thy breast, and which rend the heart of the world. I thank thee, O Lord, that thou hast wedded me unto holy poverty: yea, I will devote myself wholly to the bliss of the folly that is in thee, and will suffer men to revile and persecute me until the tenement of my body shall be taken away, until I shall have outlived the corruption of this life. Lord, thou had made me rich that I may be as one of the poor. Blessed are the poor! Blessed are the sick!"
Kissing the feet of his friend, he remained prostrate for a long time, with his head pressed upon the earth: then he rose, and both went home in silence.
A nameless fear agitated the mind of Ivo: he felt the fulness of the self-sacrifice to which Clement had given himself; but he saw also its dreadful aberration: a sword pierced his heart.
He willingly followed his friend into the nocturnal regions of man's feeling and thought: it seemed a duty to keep him company and be at hand to aid him.
The lives of the saints were the first object of their studies. Once Ivo said, "I am rejoiced to see that revelation is still upon its march through the haunts of men; saints arise wherever the Lord has revealed himself and thereby imparted his wonder-working power, and whoso truly sanctifies himself may hope to be favored in like kind. Nowadays every town has once more its true patron saint, as of old, among the Greeks, its false tutelary deity. God is personally near us everywhere."
Clement, without answering, kissed Ivo's forehead. Presently, however, he spoke warmly of the heroes who with empty hand had conquered the world.
The life of St. Francis of Assisi enlisted their special interest: the story of his conversion from the stormy life of the world, and the manner in which he first cured a leper with a kiss, was particularly attractive to Clement. Ivo was pleased by the childlike harmony of the holy man with nature, and by his miraculous power over it; how he preached to the birds, and called upon them to sing the glory of God; how they listened devoutly until he had made the sign of the cross over them and blessed them, and how then they broke into a sounding chorus; how he contended in song with a nightingale for the honor of God until midnight, and how at last, when he was silent from fatigue, the bird flew upon his hand to receive his blessing. Whenever he read of the lamb rescued by the saint from slaughter, which always kneeled down during the singing of the choir, Ivo thought fondly of his Brindle.