Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 2.djvu/73

Rh to destroy her. I command you to do this." The son answered, "The law enjoins children to honour their parents; and if I should slay my own mother contrary to the law, I should bring down her curse. Therefore in this I cannot obey you." So the woman was saved from death by the piety of her son.

My beloved, the emperor is God; the knight Christ, and the wife the soul. If the soul err, the law of God commands its death. Christ fights against the devil, and loses an arm, that is, all the austerity which incarnation confers.