In the uncontrollable weeping of English Margery Kempe there is a poignancy that speaks for many. She began to weep while on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem when “she had such great compassion and such great pain at seeing the place of Our Lord’s pain.” Thereafter her fits of “crying and roaring” and falling on the ground continued for many years, once a month or a week, sometimes daily or many times a day, sometimes in church or in the street or in her chamber or in the fields. The sight of a crucifix might set her off, “or if she saw a man or beast with a wound, or if a man beat a child before
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She would try and conceal as much as she could, that people might not hear it to their annoyance, for some said that a wicked spirit vexed her or that she had drunk too much wine. Some banned her, some wished her in the sea in a bottomless boat.” Margery Kempe was obviously an uncomfortable neighbor to have, like all those who cannot conceal the painfulness of life.
