do?" "I'faith, yes, master friar," said Ser Ciappelletto; "but I know not
who he was; only that he brought me some money which he owed me for some
cloth that I had sold him, and I put it in a box without counting it, where
a month afterwards I found four farthings more than there should have been,
which I kept for a year to return to him, but not seeing him again, I
bestowed them in alms for the love of God." "This," said the friar, "was a
small matter; and thou didst well to bestow them as thou didst." The holy
friar went on to ask him many other questions, to which he made answer in
each case in this sort. Then, as the friar was about to give him absolution,
Ser Ciappelletto interposed:--"Sir, I have yet a sin to confess." "What?"
asked the friar. "I remember," he said, "that I once caused my servant to
sweep my house on a Saturday after none; and that my observance of Sunday
was less devout than it should have been." "O, my son," said the friar,
"this is a light matter." "No," said Ser Ciappelletto, "say not a light
matter; for Sunday is the more to be had in honour because on that day our
Lord rose from the dead." Then said the holy friar:--"Now is there aught
else that thou hast done?" "Yes, master friar," replied Ser Ciappelletto,
"once by inadvertence I spat in the church of God." At this the friar began
to smile, and said:--"My son, this is not a matter to trouble about; we, who
are religious, spit there all day long." "And great impiety it is when you
so do," replied Ser Ciappelletto, "for there is nothing that is so worthy to
be kept from all impurity as the holy temple in which sacrifice is offered
to God." More he said in the same strain, which I pass over; and then at
last he began to sigh, and by and by to weep bitterly, as he was well able
to do when he chose. And the friar demanding:--"My son, why weepest thou?"
"Alas, master friar" answered Ser Ciappelletto, "a sin yet remains, which I
have never confessed, such shame were it to me to tell it; and as often as I
call it to mind, I weep as you now see me weep, being well assured that God
will never forgive me this sin." Then said the holy friar:--"Come, come,
son, what is this that thou sayst? If all the sins of all the men, that ever