Another Italian bishop whose bishopric had very little income sought through his beautiful handwriting to earn something extra by copying books.
Once as he sat in his workroom writing, a spider crawled onto the parchment and directly onto the place where he would write. The bishop tried to remove the spider by blowing on it, but when that failed, he reached for the erasure knife and cut the spider’s leg off. With that, he blew it away and quietly continued writing.
Not long afterward, the bishop was summoned by the pope to Rome to answer to a legal charge. As he had no knowledge of having done anyone wrong he wondered about the summons; nonetheless, out of guilty obedience he appeared at the prescribed time before the governor of St. Peter in Rome, arriving some days before the actual appointment. During the intervening days, he often went out and fortified himself with good wine.
When the appointment finally arrived, he was called before the pope. As he sat down, he looked around and saw that a one-legged man was also present. The pope appeared very concerned as though he was extremely embarrassed, and everyone was very quiet. Finally, one of the cardinals asked the one-legged man why he didn’t speak and state his charge.
The man didn’t need to be asked twice, and accused the bishop of having cut off his foot without provocation. The bishop countered that he would be able to defend himself if a true charge were brought against him but that this charge left him speechless, as he had never hit a person, much less to injure someone in such a brutal fashion. He therefore asked the pope to grant him a night to consider, hoping on the next day with God’s help to prove his innocence. The pope granted his wish, and at the appointed hour the bishop and his accuser appeared again before the court, but the accuser now less optimistic as on the previous day.
The bishop spoke: “Trusting to you leniency, Holy Father, I believe that what the verse (Proverbs 13:16) says: everything must be done with consideration. I mean now to reveal who has accused me and why he has done it. This man can be no other than the spider that disturbed me by my writing and thereby gave up a leg when I struck it with my knife. To determine the truth, command him under strict penalty to prove otherwise if he can, or to prove that I dealt with him otherwise.”
The pope fulfilled the bishop’s wish, and the one-footed man’s head fell as though prevented by a heavenly power to lie to the bishop. “Now it is proven, Holy Father,” said the bishop, “that this is the one who never stops tempting our brothers and whose purpose it was to corrupt our souls—yours through the unjust accusation against me, and mine through the undutiful defamation of character.
“What penalty should this hellish fiend receive for his meanness?” asked the pope. The bishop replied, “While I was walking in the city I saw a huge stone building which belongs to you. Give it to my church and command this mean fiend that he must carry it away and set it undamaged on an empty space near my church and house.” This, the pope did.
On the next morning, the building was gone from Rome and the bishop, on returning home, found it undamaged on the stated place. And so it was proven that the commands of God’s servants would be obeyed, whether given in hell or in heaven.