Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/121

 THE APOSTOLIC BRETHREN. 105 ripening grapes of an adjacent vineyard, which they accordingly stripped. At length he was joined by a certain Kobert, a servant of the Franciscans, who, as Salimbene informs us, was a liar and a thief, too lazy to work, who flourished for a while in the sect as Fra Glutto, and who finally apostatized and married a female her- mit. Gherardo and Glutto wandered through the streets of Parma in their white mantles and sandals, calling the people to repent- ance. They gathered associates, and the number rapidly grew to three hundred. They obtained a house in which to eat and sleep, and lacked for nothing, for alms came pouring in upon them more liberally than on the regular Mendicants. These latter wondered greatly, for the self-styled Apostles gave nothing in return — they could not preach, or hear confessions, or celebrate mass, and did not even pray for their benefactors. They were mostly ignorant peasants, swineherds and cowherds, attracted by an idle life which was rewarded with ample victuals and popular veneration. When gathered together in their assemblies they would gaze vacantly on Segarelli and repeat at intervals in honor of him, "Father! Father! Father!"* When the Council of Lyons, in 1274, endeavored to control the pest of these unauthorized mendicant associations, it did not dis- perse them, but contented itself with prohibiting the reception of future members, in the expectation that they would thus gradu- ally become extinguished. This was easily eluded by the Apostles, who, when a neophyte desired to join them, would lay before him a habit and say, " We do not dare to receive you, as this is pro- hibited to us, but it is not prohibited to you ; do as you think fit." Thus, in spite of papal commands, the Order increased and mul- tiplied, as we are told, beyond computation. In 1284 we hear of seventy-two postulants in a body passing through Modena and Eeggio to Parma to be adopted by Segarelli, and a few days after- wards twelve young girls came on the same errand, wrapped in their mantles and styling themselves Apostolesses. Imitating Dominic and Francis, Segarelli sent his followers throughout Eu- rope and beyond seas to evangelize the world. They penetrated far, for already in 1287 we find the Council of Wiirzburg stigma- tizing the wandering Apostles as tramps, and forbidding any one
 * Salimbene, pp. 114-16.