Note 44 — Chapter I · THE SPIRITUAL FRANCISCANS.
Reading edition
Cantù, Eretici d’Italia, I. 129.—Comba, La Riforma in Italia, I. 314.
A specimen of Jacopone’s attacks on Boniface will show the temper of the times—
“Ponesti la tua lingua Contra religione A dir blasfemia Senza niun cagione. O pessima avarizia Sete induplicata, Bever tanta pecunia E non esser saziata!” (Comba, op. cit. 312.)
There is doubtless foundation for the story related by Savonarola in a sermon, that Jacopone was once brought into the consistory of cardinals and requested to preach, when he solemnly repeated thrice, “I wonder that in consequence of your sins the earth does not open and swallow you.”—Villari, Frà Savonarola, II. Ed. T. II. p. 3.