of flesh and blood! Though it was that of a father so Catholic
and so wise--he was very much so, and this act of his could not
be the effect of any ignorance on his part--what evil it might
have done me!

18. That very night my sickness became so acute, that for about
four days I remained insensible. They administered the Sacrament
of the last Anointing, and every hour, or rather every moment,
thought I was dying; they did nothing but repeat the Credo, as if
I could have understood anything they said. They must have
regarded me as dead more than once, for I found afterwards drops
of wax on my eyelids. My father, because he had not allowed me
to go to confession, was grievously distressed. Loud cries and
many prayers were made to God: blessed be He Who heard them.

19. For a day-and-a-half the grave was open in my monastery,
waiting for my body; [10] and the Friars of our Order, in a house
at some distance from this place, performed funeral solemnities.
But it pleased our Lord I should come to myself. I wished to go
to confession at once. I communicated with many tears; but I do
not think those tears had their source in that pain and sorrow
only for having offended God, which might have sufficed for my
salvation--unless, indeed, the delusion which I laboured under
were some excuse for me, and into which I had been led by those
who had told me that some things were not mortal sins which
afterwards I found were so certainly.

20. Though my sufferings were unendurable, and my perceptions
dull, yet my confession, I believe, was complete as to all
matters wherein I understood myself to have offended God. This