and knew no letters, and did not occupy himself
willingly with the pomps of the world, the cardinals held him in small
esteem, and it seemed to them that they had made an ill choice for the
well-being and estate of the Church. The said holy father perceiving
this, and not feeling himself sufficient for the government of the
Church, as one who more loved the service of God and the weal of his
soul than worldly honour, sought every way how he might renounce the
papacy. Now, among the other cardinals of the court was one M.
Benedetto Guatani d'Alagna, very learned in books, and in the things
of the world much practised and sagacious, which had a great desire to
attain to the papal dignity; and he had laid plans seeking and
striving to obtain it by the aid of King Charles and the cardinals,
and already had the promise from them, which afterwards was fulfilled
to him. He put it before the holy father, hearing that he was desirous
to renounce the papacy, that he should make a new decretal, that for
the good of his soul any Pope might renounce the papacy, showing him
the example of S. Clement, whom, when S. Peter came to die, he desired
should be Pope after him; but he, for the good of his soul, would not
have it so, and in his room first S. Linus and then S. Cletus was
Pope. And even as the said cardinal gave counsel, Pope Celestine made
the said decretal; and this done, the day of S. Lucy in the following
December, in a consistory of all the cardinals, in their presence he
took off the crown and papal mantle, and renounced the papacy, and
departed from the court, and returned to his hermit life, and to do
his penance. And thus Pope Celestine reigned in the papacy five months
and nine days. But afterwards it is said, and was true, that his
successor, M. Benedetto Guatani aforesaid (who was afterwards Pope
Boniface), caused him to be taken prisoner in the mountains of S.
Angiolo in Apulia above Bastia, whither he had withdrawn to do
penance; and some say that he would fain have gone into Slavonia, but
the other secretly held him in the fortress of Fummone in Campagna in
honourable confinement, to the intent that so long as he lived none
should be set up as a rival to his own election, forasmuch as many
Christians held Celestine to be the right and true Pope,
notwithstanding his renunciation, maintaining that such a dignity as
was the papacy by no decretal could be renounced; and albeit S.
Clement refused the papacy at the first