364 BuoniCattolici
nations of conscience. How common was the use of such booklets? The
extant manuscripts are often heavily worn and cheaply produced. It is sur-
prising that after such handling they survived at all. This suggests that there
were many other little ‘‘pocket books’’ of devotion that have perished. By
the early 1300 s, such books had probably become quite common. But written
prayers, themselves read aloud, never challenged the simple recitation of
Paters and Aves before an image of Christ or the Virgin. Hagiographic
sources suggest that this was the near-universal devotional practice of the
laity. In contrast, the world of written prayer seems somewhat rarefied, even
when focused on the cross.
Prayers toGod,theSavior,and theSaints
To compose prayers is to theologize, to put into words the absolute depen-
dence of the Christian on God. This is true even when the supplicant prays
merely to obtain a temporal favor. One vernacular prayer from an early-
fourteenth-century codex captures the majesty of the Deity addressed in
stunning verses:
No one can make any plan
without union to the First Creator.
God has no dependence on anything,
for there was no creator before him.
Rather, he always existed for himself;
he was first, with no predecessor.
So also he has no ending,
no cause, nothing greater.
The Creator could not be created,
for there was before him nothing prior;
To be created is to be unable to create.
Filling all, above, below, and under the earth,
Formed by him, we ask you for life,
sense, power, benefit, love.^113This is an expression more elevated than the average, but it captures the
dependence implicit in every act of prayer, no matter how simple or unso-
phisticated. Prayers before the cross powerfully combined the aspects of pen-
ance and Christocentricity so typical of thirteenth-century Italian piety with
- Bologna, Biblioteca Universitaria,ms 1563, fol. 43 v: ‘‘Non si formara alcuno ordinamento, senza
lunati primo ordinatore.Pero non abbe Deu conenzamento, la non fu nanzi a fie conditore.Ma essu
stessu ad essu sempre essento, fu prima senza primo antecessore.Ande pero non a mai finimento, la
non abbe conenzo ne maiore.Non pottel creatore esser creato, per chel fu primo nanzi ad onne primo.
Abere creao sie non potte creare, sopra sotta infra teri pleno et dalato.Essere forma da lui vitepemo
vita; sentire, puovere, tenere, amare.’’