tito’s visit to san marco had been announced beforehand, and he was at once conducted by fra niccolo, savonarola’s secretary, up the spiral staircase into the long corridors lined with cells — corridors where fra angelico’s frescoes, delicate as the rainbow on the melting cloud, startled the unaccustomed eye here and there, as if they had been sudden reflections cast from an ethereal world, where the madonna sat crowned in her radiant glory, and the divine infant looked forth with perpetual promise.
it was an hour of relaxation in the monastery, and most of the cells were empty. the light through the narrow windows looked in on nothing but bare walls, and the hard pallet and the crucifix. and even behind that door at the end of a long corridor, in the inner cell opening from an ante-chamber where the prior usually sat at his desk or received private visitors, the high jet of light fell on only one more object that looked quite as common a monastic sight as the bare walls and hard pallet. it was but the back of a figure in the long white dominican tunic and scapulary, kneeling with bowed head before a crucifix. it might have been any ordinary fra girolamo, who had nothing worse to confess than thinking of wrong things when he was singing in coro, or feeling a spiteful joy when fra benedetto dropped the ink over his own miniatures in the breviary he was illuminating — who had no higher thought than that of climbing safely into paradise up the narrow ladder of prayer, fasting, and obedience. but under this particular white tunic there was a heart beating with a consciousness inconceivable to the average monk, and perhaps hard to be conceived by any man who has not arrived at self-knowledge through a tumultuous inner life: a consciousness in which irrevocable errors and lapses from veracity were so entwined with noble purposes and sincere beliefs, in which self-justifying expediency was so inwoven with the tissue of a great work which the whole being seemed as unable to abandon as the body was unable to abandon glowing and trembling before the objects of hope and fear, that it was perhaps impossible, whatever course might be adopted, for the conscience to find perfect repose.
savonarola was not only in the attitude of prayer, there were latin words of prayer on his lips; and yet he was not praying. he had entered his cell, had fallen on his knees, and burst into words of supplication, seeking in this way for an influx of calmness which would be a warrant to him that the resolutions urged on him by crowding thoughts and passions were not wresting him away from the divine support; but the previsions and impulses which had been at work within him for the last hour were too imperious; and while he pressed his hands against his face, and while his lips were uttering audibly, ‘cor mundum crea in me,’ his mind was still filled with the images of the snare his enemies had prepared for him, was still busy with the arguments by which he could justify himself against their taunts and accusations.
and it was not only against his opponents that savonarola had to defend himself. this morning he had had new proof that his friends and followers were as much inclined to urge on the trial by fire as his enemies: desiring and tacitly expecting that he himself would at last accept the challenge and evoke the long-expected miracle which was to dissipate doubt and triumph over malignity. had he not said that god would declare himself at the fitting time? and to the understanding of plain florentines, eager to get party questions settled, it seemed that no time could be more fitting than this. certainly, if fra domenico walked through the fire unhurt, that would be a miracle, and the faith and ardour of that good brother were felt to be a cheering augury; but savonarola was acutely conscious that the secret longing of his followers to see him accept the challenge had not been dissipated by any reasons he had given for his refusal.
yet it was impossible to him to satisfy them; and with bitter distress he saw now that it was impossible for him any longer to resist the prosecution of the trial in fra domenico’s case. not that savonarola had uttered and written a falsity when he declared his belief in a future supernatural attestation of his work; but his mind was so constituted that while it was easy for him to believe in a miracle which, being distant and undefined, was screened behind the strong reasons he saw for its occurrence, and yet easier for him to have a belief in inward miracles such as his own prophetic inspiration and divinely-wrought intuitions; it was at the same time insurmountably difficult to him to believe in the probability of a miracle which, like this of being carried unhurt through the fire, pressed in all its details on his imagination and involved a demand not only for belief but for exceptional action.
savonarola’s nature was one of those in which opposing tendencies coexist in almost equal strength: the passionate sensibility which, impatient of definite thought, floods every idea with emotion and tends towards contemplative ecstasy, alternated in him with a keen perception of outward facts and a vigorous practical judgment of men and things. and in this case of the trial by fire, the latter characteristics were stimulated into unusual activity by an acute physical sensitiveness which gives overpowering force to the conception of pain and destruction as a necessary sequence of facts which have already been causes of pain in our experience. the promptitude with which men will consent to touch red-hot iron with a wet finger is not to be measured by their theoretic acceptance of the impossibility that the iron will burn them: practical belief depends on what is most strongly represented in the mind at a given moment. and with the frate’s constitution, when the trial by fire was urged on his imagination as an immediate demand, it was impossible for him to believe that he or any other man could walk through the flames unhurt — impossible for him to believe that even if he resolved to offer himself, he would not shrink at the last moment.
but the florentines were not likely to make these fine distinctions. to the common run of mankind it has always seemed a proof of mental vigour to find moral questions easy, and judge conduct according to concise alternatives. and nothing was likely to seem plainer than that a man who at one time declared that god would not leave him without the guarantee of a miracle, and yet drew back when it was proposed to test his declaration, had said what he did not believe. were not fra domenico and fra mariano, and scores of piagnoni besides, ready to enter the fire? what was the cause of their superior courage, if it was not their superior faith? savonarola could not have explained his conduct satisfactorily to his friends, even if he had been able to explain it thoroughly to himself. and he was not. our naked feelings make haste to clothe themselves in propositions which lie at hand among our store of opinions, and to give a true account of what passes within us something else is necessary besides sincerity, even when sincerity is unmixed. in these very moments, when savonarola was kneeling in audible prayer, he had ceased to hear the words on his lips. they were drowned by argumentative voices within him that shaped their reasons more and more for an outward audience.
‘to appeal to heaven for a miracle by a rash acceptance of a challenge, which is a mere snare prepared for me by ignoble foes, would be a tempting of god, and the appeal would not be responded to. let the pope’s legate come, let the ambassadors of all the great powers come and promise that the calling of a general council and the reform of the church shall hang on the miracle, and i will enter the flames, trusting that god will not withhold his seal from that great work. until then i reserve myself for higher duties which are directly laid upon me: it is not permitted to me to leap from the chariot for the sake of wrestling with every loud vaunter. but fra domenico’s invincible zeal to enter into the trial may be the sign of a divine vocation, may be a pledge that the miracle —’
but no! when savonarola brought his mind close to the threatened scene in the piazza, and imagined a human body entering the fire, his belief recoiled again. it was not an event that his imagination could simply see: he felt it with shuddering vibrations to the extremities of his sensitive fingers. the miracle could not be. nay, the trial itself was not to happen: he was warranted in doing all in his power to hinder it. the fuel might be got ready in the piazza, the people might be assembled, the preparatory formalities might be gone through: all this was perhaps inevitable now, and he could no longer resist it without bringing dishonour on — himself? yes, and therefore on the cause of god. but it was not really intended that the franciscan should enter the fire, and while he hung back there would be the means of preventing fra domenico’s entrance. at the very worst, if fra domenico were compelled to enter, he should carry the consecrated host with him, and with that mystery in his hand, there might be a warrant for expecting that the ordinary effects of fire would be stayed; or, more probably, this demand would be resisted, and might thus be a final obstacle to the trial.
but these intentions could not be avowed: he must appear frankly to await the trial, and to trust in its issue. that dissidence between inward reality and outward seeming was not the christian simplicity after which he had striven through years of his youth and prime, and which he had preached as a chief fruit of the divine life. in the stress and heat of the day, with cheeks burning, with shouts ringing in the ears, who is so blest as to remember the yearnings he had in the cool and silent morning and know that he has not belied them?
‘god, it is for the sake of the people — because they are blind — because their faith depends on me. if i put on sack-cloth and cast myself among the ashes, who will take up the standard and head the battle? have i not been led by a way which i knew not to the work that lies before me?’
the conflict was one that could not end, and in the effort at prayerful pleading the uneasy mind laved its smart continually in thoughts of the greatness of that task which there was no man else to fulfil if he forsook it. it was not a thing of every day that a man should be inspired with the vision and the daring that made a sacred rebel.
even the words of prayer had died away. he continued to kneel, but his mind was filled with the images of results to be felt through all europe; and the sense of immediate difficulties was being lost in the glow of that vision, when the knocking at the door announced the expected visit.
savonarola drew on his mantle before he left his cell, as was his custom when he received visitors; and with that immediate response to any appeal from without which belongs to a power-loving nature accustomed to make its power felt by speech, he met tito with a glance as self-possessed and strong as if he had risen from resolution instead of conflict.
tito did not kneel, but simply made a greeting of profound deference, which savonarola received quietly without any sacerdotal words, and then desiring him to be seated, said at once —
‘your business is something of weight, my son, that could not be conveyed through others?’
‘assuredly, father, else i should not have presumed to ask it. i will not trespass on your time by any proem. i gathered from a remark of messer domenico mazzinghi that you might be glad to make use of the next special courier who is sent to france with despatches from the ten. i must entreat you to pardon me if i have been too ofiicious; but inasmuch as messer domenico is at this moment away at his villa, i wished to apprise you that a courier carrying important letters is about to depart for lyons at daybreak to-morrow;’
the muscles of fra girolamo’s face were eminently under command, as must be the case with all men whose personality is powerful, and in deliberate speech he was habitually cautious, confiding his intentions to none without necessity. but under any strong mental stimulus, his eyes were liable to a dilatation and added brilliancy that no strength of will could control. he looked steadily at tito, and did not answer immediately, as if he had to consider whether the information he had just heard met any purpose of his.
tito, whose glance never seemed observant, but rarely let anything escape it, had expected precisely that dilatation and flash of savonarola’s eyes which he had noted on other occasions. he saw it, and then immediately busied himself in adjusting his gold fibula, which had got wrong; seeming to imply that he awaited an answer patiently.
the fact was that savonarola had expected to receive this intimation from domenico mazzinghi, one of the ten, an ardent disciple of his whom he had already employed to write a private letter to the florentine ambassador in france, to prepare the way for a letter to the french king himself in savonarola’s handwriting, which now lay ready in the desk at his side. it was a letter calling on the king to assist in summoning a general council, that might reform the abuses of the church, and begin by deposing pope alexander, who was not rightfully pope, being a vicious unbeliever, elected by corruption and governing by simony.
this fact was not what tito knew, but what his constructive talent, guided by subde indications, had led him to guess and hope.
‘it is true, my son,’ said savonarola, quietly, — ‘it is true i have letters which i would gladly send by safe conveyance under cover to our ambassador. our community of san marco, as you know, has affairs in france, being, amongst other things, responsible for a debt to that singularly wise and experienced frenchman, signor philippe de comines, on the library of the medici, which we purchased; but i apprehend that domenico mazzinghi himself may return to the city before evening, and i should gain more time for preparation of the letters if i waited to deposit them in his hands.’
‘assuredly, reverend father, that might be better on all grounds, except one, namely, that if anything occurred to hinder messer domenico’s return, the despatch of the letters would require either that i should come to san marco again at a late hour, or that you should send them to me by your secretary; and i am aware that you wish to guard against the false inferences which might be drawn from a too frequent communication between yourself and any officer of the government.’ in throwing out this difficulty tito felt that the more unwillingness the frate showed to trust him, the more certain he would be of his conjecture.
savonarola was silent; but while he kept his mouth firm, a slight glow rose in his face with the suppressed excitement that was growing within him. it would be a critical moment — that in which he delivered the letter out of his own hands.
‘it is most probable that messer domenico will return in time,’ said tito, affecting to consider the frate’s determination settled, and rising from his chair as he spoke. ‘with your permission, i will take my leave, father, not to trespass on your time when my errand is done — but as i may not be favoured with another interview, i venture to confide to you — what is not yet known to others except to the magnificent ten — that i contemplate resigning my secretaryship, and leaving florence shortly. am i presuming too much on your interest in stating what relates chiefly to myself?’
‘speak on, my son,’ said the frate; ‘i desire to know your prospects.’
‘i find, then, that i have mistaken my real vocation in forsaking the career of pure letters, for which i was brought up. the politics of florence, father, are worthy to occupy the greatest mind — to occupy yours — when a man is in a position to execute his own ideas; but when, like me, he can only hope to be the mere instrument of changing schemes, he requires to be animated by the minor attachments of a born florentine: also, my wife’s unhappy alienation from a florentine residence since the painful events of august naturally influences me. i wish to join her.’
savonarola inclined his head approvingly.
‘i intend, then, soon to leave florence, to visit the chief courts of europe, and to widen my acquaintance with the men of letters in the various universities. i shall go first to the court of hungary, where scholars are eminently welcome; and i shall probably start in a week or ten days. i have not concealed from you, father, that i am no religious enthusiast; i have not my wife’s ardour but religious enthusiasm, as i conceive, is not necessary in order to appreciate the grandeur and justice of your views concerning the government of nations and the church. and if you condescend to intrust me with any commission that will further the relations you wish to establish, i shall feel honoured. may i now take my leave?’
‘stay, my son. when you depart from florence i will send a letter to your wife, of whose spiritual welfare i would fain be assured, for she left me in anger. as for the letters to france, such as i have ready —’
savonarola rose and turned to his desk as he spoke. he took from it a letter on which tito could see, but not read. an address in the frate’s own minute and exquisite handwriting, still to be seen covering the margins of his bibles. he took a large sheet of paper, enclosed the letter, and sealed it.
‘pardon me, father,’ said tito, before savonarola had time to speak, ‘unless it were your decided wish, i would rather not incur the responsibility of carrying away the letter. messer domenico mazzinghi will doubtless return, or, if not, fra niccolo can convey it to me at the second hour of the evening, when i shall place the other despatches in the courier’s hands.’
‘at present, my son,’ said the frate, waiving that point, ‘i wish you to address this packet to our ambassador in your own handwriting, which is preferable to my secretary’s.’
tito sat down to write the address while the frate stood by him with folded arms, the glow mounting in his cheek, and his lip at last quivering. tito rose and was about to move away, when savonarola said abruptly — ‘take it, my son. there is no use in waiting. it does not please me that fra niccolo should have needless errands to the palazzo.’
as tito took the letter, savonarola stood in suppressed excitement that forbade further speech. there seems to be a subtle emanation from passionate natures like his, making their mental states tell immediately on others; when they are absent-minded and inwardly excited there is silence in the air.
tito made a deep reverence and went out with the letter under his mantle.
the letter was duly delivered to the courier and carried out of florence. but before that happened another messenger, privately employed by tito, had conveyed information in cipher, which was carried by a series of relays to armed agents of ludovico sforza, duke of milan, on the watch for the very purpose of intercepting despatches on the borders of the milanese territory.
