As soon as Anthony had regulated the affairs of his province he took up the cross and hastened to the people who had been captured "by heresy in Italy, as well as in France and Germany. They were the Cathares, or Patarins, who were very numerous in Roumania and in Emilia; the Circoncis in Lombardy; the Vaudois, entrenched in the Milanese and in the mountains of Piedmont. These sects were only varieties of the same heresy with which the Albigenses connected themselves, and they made great inroads in the south of France.
Faithful to his old methods, Anthony commenced by protecting the poor people against the seductions of the Manichean heresies. The lowly were dear to him. To him they were the cherished lambs of the flock of Christ. He led them to the pastures of the true faith. He quenched their thirst at the pure and sacred sources which flowed from the opened side of the Saviour. But, like the good shepherd, he did not take flight at the coming of the wolves who raged about the flock. He went out to meet them and endeavored to subdue them.
Rimini had become the camp of the Cathares. A man less resolute than Anthony would have hesitated to enter into this discontented and rebellious city. He, however, enters it, having decided to announce the word of truth, in season and out of season, to convict the shameless sectarians of error and perfidy, and to threaten them with the judgments of God. But his eloquence, usually so attractive, from his frank and courageous manner, produced no effect. The Cathares, angered at the zeal with which he attacked them, would not yield, even so far as listening to him. They remained harder than stones; not content with refusing to give ear to his reasoning, they left him to preach by himself.
But Anthony was not discouraged. He turned his eyes towards heaven. In prayer he shed abundant tears until the inspiration of grace came to his aid. He conceived the idea of preaching to the sea, since the earth responded so badly to the appeals of his charity. By bringing man to a school of dumb irrational creatures, he wished to give him a solemn lesson. He hoped to take away from the Cathares all their influence over the people since they would not yield to manifest truth. God sustained the faith of His apostle.
Saint Anthony then went to the shore where the river flows into the sea. Standing there, between the river and the sea, he cried out in a loud voice: "Hear me, ye fishes of the sea. It is to you that I am about to announce the Word of God, since the heretics refuse to listen to it."
At the sound of his voice the waters trembled; the countless tribes which inhabit them hastened to range themselves as if in battle array, the smallest in front, the largest in the rear, with every head turned towards him who had called them. "My brethren," said the wonder-worker to them, "you owe your Creator a boundless gratitude. He it is who has assigned to you as a dwelling this noble element and these immense reservoirs. He it is who provides for your refuge in tempests the depths of the waters, gives you fins to go whither you will, and furnishes you with your daily food. In creating you He has commanded you to increase and multiply and blessed you. At the universal deluge, while other animals perished in the floods, He preserved you. He honored you by selecting you to save the prophet Jonas, to furnish tribute to the Incarnate Word, and to serve Him as nourishment before, as well as after, His resurrection. Then praise and bless the Lord who has favored you among all created beings."
Attentive, as if they had been endowed with reason, the fishes testified by their movements the pleasure they took in listening to the saint, and that they wished to render to the Most High the mute tribute of their homage. "See," said the apostle, turning to the multitudes, "see for yourselves how creatures devoid of reason hear the Word with more docility than men created to God's likeness."
When the news of this wonder was reported all the inhabitants of the city hastened to Anthony. The Cathares themselves yielded to the popular enthusiasm, and were witnesses of the dominion which the apostle exercised over the sea. The spectacle touched them, and falling at the feet of the wonder-worker, they begged of him to instruct and enlighten them.
Thus they came of their own accord, anticipating his own desires. At last the faithful rejoiced; the heretics opened their eyes to the splendors of the faith. During this time the fishes listened and applauded in their own way without departing. They seemed as if awaiting the blessing of the saint before resuming the liberty of their sports. He blessed them, dismissed them, and at once they dispersed in every direction, according to the instincts which guide them in the waters.
The wonder-worker remained several weeks at Rimini to reap the fruits of his victory. They were most abundant. One of the principal leaders of the sect named Bouvilla, bound for thirty years in the bonds of heresy, publicly retracted his errors. His abjuration was most remarkable, and he was followed by most of his co-religionists.
Some of them, however, furious at their defeat, resolved to be avenged by poisoning their adversary. They invited the apostle to dinner, and gave him poisoned meat to eat. The saint, who knew by revelation of the infernal plot which they had planned against his life, reproached them. They were not in the least disconcerted, and adding irony to their cruelty, they endeavored to ensnare him by a dilemma from which he could not escape, so they thought, without admitting he was conquered. "Either you believe in the Gospel or you do not. If you believe in it, why do you doubt the accomplishment of the prophecy of your Master who promised that His disciples should cast out demons, and poisons should not injure them? If you do not believe in the truth of the Gospel why do you preach it? Take this poison and if it does not injure you, we swear to you to embrace the Catholic faith." "I will do it," replied the intrepid missionary; "not to tempt God, but to prove to you how much I have at heart the salvation of your souls and the triumph of the Gospel." Then making the sign of the cross on the poisoned meats, he ate them without experiencing the least inconvenience; and the angels inscribed in the golden book of the elect a new victory and new names. The heretics kept their word, and, sincere and convinced, re-entered the fold of the Catholic Church.
The wonder-worker had entered Rimini saddened and in tears; he left it amid popular ovations. All the people accompanied him to the port, where he embarked for Illyria, and the reconciled Cathares were not the least enthusiastic in their acclamations. He traversed the Adriatic, landing on the shores of Illyria, and evangelized all the seashore of the gulf of Trieste, from Aquilla to Venice, passing by Goritz, Udine, Gemona, and Conegliano. Here he attacked the Patarins in their last entrenchments; there he restored to the degenerate Christians the integral faith of their baptism.
The blessed Anthony was at Gemona, near Udine. He had accepted a foundation in that city, and he himself superintended the work of construction. Seeing a peasant passing near the lumber-yard in a cart drawn by two oxen, he asked him to lend his cart to carry some bricks and lumber. The peasant answered it was "impossible." He was not inclined to give gratuitous service. "I am carrying a dead man," he said. He told a falsehood, for the pretended dead man was his own son who was lying asleep in the cart. Shortly after the peasant endeavored to awaken his son to tell him how he had fooled the monk-mason. But he tried in vain. He had spoken the truth without knowing it, when he said he carried a dead man. At the sight of the corpse he was seized with fear and repentance. He left his cart and oxen and ran to cast himself at the feet of the wonder-worker, conjuring him to pardon his falsehood and restore him his son. The sorrow of a father is something sacred. The saint returned with the peasant to the funeral cart, made the sign of the cross on the corpse, and gave his hand to the young man now restored to life and health. To do good to those who do evil to you is the vengeance of the saints.
On the first of the following year the apostle left Gemona and travelled rapidly through Trevise and Venice, as he was anxious to see his convent and his brethren at Padua.
- taken from Saint Anthony, The Saint of the Whole World by Father Thomas F Ward