St.
Francis of Assisi
Founder of the Franciscan Order, born at Assisi in Umbria, in 1181 or
1182 -- the exact year is uncertain; died there, 3 October, 1226.
His father,
Pietro Bernardone, was a wealthy Assisian cloth merchant. Of his mother,
Pica, little is known, but she is said to have belonged to a noble family
of Provence. Francis was one of several children. The legend that he
was born in a stable dates from the fifteenth century only, and appears
to have originated in the desire of certain writers to make his life
resemble that of Christ. At baptism the saint received the name of Giovanni,
which his father afterwards altered to Francesco, through fondness it
would seem for France, whither business had led him at the time of his
son's birth. In any case, since the child was renamed in infancy, the
change can hardly have had anything to do with his aptitude for learning
French, as some have thought.
Francis
received some elementary instruction from the priests of St. George's
at Assisi, though he learned more perhaps in the school of the Troubadours,
who were just then making for refinement in Italy. However this may
be, he was not very studious, and his literary education remained incomplete.
Although associated with his father in trade, he showed little liking
for a merchant's career, and his parents seemed to have indulged his
every whim. Thomas of Celano, his first biographer, speaks in very severe
terms of Francis's youth. Certain it is that the saint's early life
gave no presage of the golden years that were to come. No one loved
pleasure more than Francis; he had a ready wit, sang merrily, delighted
in fine clothes and showy display. Handsome, gay, gallant, and courteous,
he soon became the prime favourite among the young nobles of Assisi,
the foremost in every feat of arms, the leader of the civil revels,
the very king of frolic. But even at this time Francis showed an instinctive
sympathy with the poor, and though he spent money lavishly, it still
flowed in such channels as to attest a princely magnanimity of spirit.
When
about twenty, Francis went out with the townsmen to fight the Perugians
in one of the petty skirmishes so frequent at that time between the
rival cities. The Assisians were defeated on this occasion, and Francis,
being among those taken prisoners, was held captive for more than a
year in Perugia. A low fever which he there contracted appears to have
turned his thoughts to the things of eternity; at least the emptiness
of the life he had been leading came to him during that long illness.
With returning health, however, Francis's eagerness after glory reawakened
and his fancy wandered in search of victories; at length he resolved
to embrace a military career, and circumstances seemed to favour his
aspirations. A knight of Assisi was about to join "the gentle count",
Walter of Brienne, who was then in arms in the Neapolitan States against
the emperor, and Francis arranged to accompany him. His biographers
tell us that the night before Francis set forth he had a strange dream,
in which he saw a vast hall hung with armour all marked with the Cross.
"These", said a voice, "are for you and your soldiers."
"I know I shall be a great prince", exclaimed Francis exultingly,
as he started for Apulia. But a second illness arrested his course at
Spoleto. There, we are told, Francis had another dream in which the
same voice bade him turn back to Assisi. He did so at once. This was
in 1205.
Although
Francis still joined at times in the noisy revels of his former comrades,
his changed demeanour plainly showed that his heart was no longer with
them; a yearning for the life of the spirit had already possessed it.
His companions twitted Francis on his absent-mindedness and asked if
he were minded to be married. "Yes", he replied, "I am
about to take a wife of surpassing fairness." She was no other
than Lady Poverty whom Dante and Giotto have wedded to his name, and
whom even now he had begun to love. After a short period of uncertainty
he began to seek in prayer and solitude the answer to his call; he had
already given up his gay attire and wasteful ways. One day, while crossing
the Umbrian plain on horseback, Francis unexpectedly drew near a poor
leper. The sudden appearance of this repulsive object filled him with
disgust and he instinctively retreated, but presently controlling his
natural aversion he dismounted, embraced the unfortunate man, and gave
him all the money he had. About the same time Francis made a pilgrimage
to Rome. Pained at the miserly offerings he saw at the tomb of St. Peter,
he emptied his purse thereon. Then, as if to put his fastidious nature
to the test, he exchanged clothes with a tattered mendicant and stood
for the rest of the day fasting among the horde of beggars at the door
of the basilica.
Not long
after his return to Assisi, whilst Francis was praying before an ancient
crucifix in the forsaken wayside chapel of St. Damian's below the town,
he heard a voice saying: "Go, Francis, and repair my house, which
as you see is falling into ruin." Taking this behest literally,
as referring to the ruinous church wherein he knelt, Francis went to
his father's shop, impulsively bundled together a load of coloured drapery,
and mounting his horse hastened to Foligno, then a mart of some importance,
and there sold both horse and stuff to procure the money needful for
the restoration of St. Damian's. When, however, the poor priest who
officiated there refused to receive the gold thus gotten, Francis flung
it from him disdainfully. The elder Bernardone, a most niggardly man,
was incensed beyond measure at his son's conduct, and Francis, to avert
his father's wrath, hid himself in a cave near St. Damian's for a whole
month. When he emerged from this place of concealment and returned to
the town, emaciated with hunger and squalid with dirt, Francis was followed
by a hooting rabble, pelted with mud and stones, and otherwise mocked
as a madman. Finally, he was dragged home by his father, beaten, bound,
and locked in a dark closet.
Freed
by his mother during Bernardone's absence, Francis returned at once
to St. Damian's, where he found a shelter with the officiating priest,
but he was soon cited before the city consuls by his father. The latter,
not content with having recovered the scattered gold from St. Damian's,
sought also to force his son to forego his inheritance. This Francis
was only too eager to do; he declared, however, that since he had entered
the service of God he was no longer under civil jurisdiction. Having
therefore been taken before the bishop, Francis stripped himself of
the very clothes he wore, and gave them to his father, saying: "Hitherto
I have called you my father on earth; henceforth I desire to say only
'Our Father who art in Heaven.'" Then and there, as Dante sings,
were solemnized Francis's nuptials with his beloved spouse, the Lady
Poverty, under which name, in the mystical language afterwards so familiar
to him, he comprehended the total surrender of all worldly goods, honours,
and privileges. And now Francis wandered forth into the hills behind
Assisi, improvising hymns of praise as he went. "I am the herald
of the great King", he declared in answer to some robbers, who
thereupon despoiled him of all he had and threw him scornfully in a
snow drift. Naked and half frozen, Francis crawled to a neighbouring
monastery and there worked for a time as a scullion. At Gubbio, whither
he went next, Francis obtained from a friend the cloak, girdle, and
staff of a pilgrim as an alms. Returning to Assisi, he traversed the
city begging stones for the restoration of St. Damian's. These he carried
to the old chapel, set in place himself, and so at length rebuilt it.
In the same way Francis afterwards restored two other deserted chapels,
St. Peter's, some distance from the city, and St. Mary of the Angels,
in the plain below it, at a spot called the Porziuncola. Meantime he
redoubled his zeal in works of charity, more especially in nursing the
lepers.
On a
certain morning in 1208, probably 24 February, Francis was hearing Mass
in the chapel of St. Mary of the Angels, near which he had then built
himself a hut; the Gospel of the day told how the disciples of Christ
were to possess neither gold nor silver, nor scrip for their journey,
nor two coats, nor shoes, nor a staff, and that they were to exhort
sinners to repentance and announce the Kingdom of God. Francis took
these words as if spoken directly to himself, and so soon as Mass was
over threw away the poor fragment left him of the world's goods, his
shoes, cloak, pilgrim staff, and empty wallet. At last he had found
his vocation. Having obtained a coarse woolen tunic of "beast colour",
the dress then worn by the poorest Umbrian peasants, and tied it round
him with a knotted rope, Francis went forth at once exhorting the people
of the country-side to penance, brotherly love, and peace. The Assisians
had already ceased to scoff at Francis; they now paused in wonderment;
his example even drew others to him. Bernard of Quintavalle, a magnate
of the town, was the first to join Francis, and he was soon followed
by Peter of Cattaneo, a well-known canon of the cathedral. In true spirit
of religious enthusiasm, Francis repaired to the church of St. Nicholas
and sought to learn God's will in their regard by thrice opening at
random the book of the Gospels on the altar. Each time it opened at
passages where Christ told His disciples to leave all things and follow
Him. "This shall be our rule of life", exclaimed Francis,
and led his companions to the public square, where they forthwith gave
away all their belongings to the poor. After this they procured rough
habits like that of Francis, and built themselves small huts near his
at the Porziuncola. A few days later Giles, afterwards the great ecstatic
and sayer of "good words", became the third follower of Francis.
The little band divided and went about, two and two, making such an
impression by their words and behaviour that before long several other
disciples grouped themselves round Francis eager to share his poverty,
among them being Sabatinus, vir bonus et justus, Moricus, who had belonged
to the Crucigeri, John of Capella, who afterwards fell away, Philip
"the Long", and four others of whom we know only the names.
When
the number of his companions had increased to eleven, Francis found
it expedient to draw up a written rule for them. This first rule, as
it is called, of the Friars Minor has not come down to us in its original
form, but it appears to have been very short and simple, a mere adaptation
of the Gospel precepts already selected by Francis for the guidance
of his first companions, and which he desired to practice in all their
perfection. When this rule was ready the Penitents of Assisi, as Francis
and his followers styled themselves, set out for Rome to seek the approval
of the Holy See, although as yet no such approbation was obligatory.
There are differing accounts of Francis's reception by Innocent III.
It seems, however, that Guido, Bishop of Assisi, who was then in Rome,
commended Francis to Cardinal John of St. Paul, and that at the instance
of the latter, the pope recalled the saint whose first overtures he
had, as it appears, somewhat rudely rejected. Moreover, in site of the
sinister predictions of others in the Sacred College, who regarded the
mode of life proposed by Francis as unsafe and impracticable, Innocent,
moved it is said by a dream in which he beheld the Poor Man of Assisi
upholding the tottering Lateran, gave a verbal sanction to the rule
submitted by Francis and granted the saint and his companions leave
to preach repentance everywhere. Before leaving Rome they all received
the ecclesiastical tonsure, Francis himself being ordained deacon later
on.
After
their return to Assisi, the Friars Minor -- for thus Francis had named
his brethren, either after the minores, or lower classes, as some think,
or as others believe, with reference to the Gospel (Matthew 25:40-45),
and as a perpetual reminder of their humility -- found shelter in a
deserted hut at Rivo Torto in the plain below the city, but were forced
to abandon this poor abode by a rough peasant who drove in his ass upon
them. About 1211 they obtained a permanent foothold near Assisi, through
the generosity of the Benedictines of Monte Subasio, who gave them the
little chapel of St. Mary of the Angels or the Porziuncola. Adjoining
this humble sanctuary, already dear to Francis, the first Franciscan
convent was formed by the erection of a few small huts or cells of wattle,
straw, and mud, and enclosed by a hedge. From this settlement, which
became the cradle of the Franciscan Order (Caput et Mater Ordinis) and
the central spot in the life of St. Francis, the Friars Minor went forth
two by two exhorting the people of the surrounding country. Like children
"careless of the day", they wandered from place to place singing
in their joy, and calling themselves the Lord's minstrels. The wide
world was their cloister; sleeping in haylofts, grottos, or church porches,
they toiled with the labourers in the fields, and when none gave them
work they would beg. In a short while Francis and his companions gained
an immense influence, and men of different grades of life and ways of
thought flocked to the order. Among the new recruits made about this
time By Francis were the famous Three Companions, who afterwards wrote
his life, namely: Angelus Tancredi, a noble cavalier; Leo, the saint's
secretary and confessor; and Rufinus, a cousin of St. Clare; besides
Juniper, "the renowned jester of the Lord".
During
the Lent of 1212, a new joy, great as it was unexpected, came to Francis.
Clare, a young heiress of Assisi, moved by the saint's preaching at
the church of St. George, sought him out, and begged to be allowed to
embrace the new manner of life he had founded. By his advice, Clare,
who was then but eighteen, secretly left her father's house on the night
following Palm Sunday, and with two companions went to the Porziuncola,
where the friars met her in procession, carrying lighted torches. Then
Francis, having cut off her hair, clothed her in the Minorite habit
and thus received her to a life of poverty, penance, and seclusion.
Clare stayed provisionally with some Benedictine nuns near Assisi, until
Francis could provide a suitable retreat for her, and for St. Agnes,
her sister, and the other pious maidens who had joined her. He eventually
established them at St. Damian's, in a dwelling adjoining the chapel
he had rebuilt with his own hands, which was now given to the saint
by the Benedictines as domicile for his spiritual daughters, and which
thus became the first monastery of the Second Franciscan Order of Poor
Ladies, now known as Poor Clares.
In the
autumn of the same year (1212) Francis's burning desire for the conversion
of the Saracens led him to embark for Syria, but having been shipwrecked
on the coast of Slavonia, he had to return to Ancona. The following
spring he devoted himself to evangelizing Central Italy. About this
time (1213) Francis received from Count Orlando of Chiusi the mountain
of La Verna, an isolated peak among the Tuscan Apennines, rising some
4000 feet above the valley of the Casentino, as a retreat, "especially
favourable for contemplation", to which he might retire from time
to time for prayer and rest. For Francis never altogether separated
the contemplative from the active life, as the several hermitages associated
with his memory, and the quaint regulations he wrote for those living
in them bear witness. At one time, indeed, a strong desire to give himself
wholly to a life of contemplation seems to have possessed the saint.
During the next year (1214) Francis set out for Morocco, in another
attempt to reach the infidels and, if needs be, to shed his blood for
the Gospel, but while yet in Spain was overtaken by so severe an illness
that he was compelled to turn back to Italy once more.
Authentic
details are unfortunately lacking of Francis's journey to Spain and
sojourn there. It probably took place in the winter of 1214-1215. After
his return to Umbria he received several noble and learned men into
his order, including his future biographer Thomas of Celano. The next
eighteen months comprise, perhaps, the most obscure period of the saint's
life. That he took part in the Lateran Council of 1215 may well be,
but it is not certain; we know from Eccleston, however, that Francis
was present at the death of Innocent III, which took place at Perugia,
in July 1216. Shortly afterwards, i.e. very early in the pontificate
of Honorius III, is placed the concession of the famous Porziuncola
Indulgence. It is related that once, while Francis was praying at the
Porziuncola, Christ appeared to him and offered him whatever favour
he might desire. The salvation of souls was ever the burden of Francis's
prayers, and wishing moreover, to make his beloved Porziuncola a sanctuary
where many might be saved, he begged a plenary Indulgence for all who,
having confessed their sins, should visit the little chapel. Our Lord
acceded to this request on condition that the pope should ratify the
Indulgence. Francis thereupon set out for Perugia, with Brother Masseo,
to find Honorius III. The latter, notwithstanding some opposition from
the Curia at such an unheard-of favour, granted the Indulgence, restricting
it, however, to one day yearly. He subsequently fixed 2 August in perpetuity,
as the day for gaining this Porziuncola Indulgence, commonly known in
Italy as il perdono d'Assisi. Such is the traditional account. The fact
that there is no record of this Indulgence in either the papal or diocesan
archives and no allusion to it in the earliest biographies of Francis
or other contemporary documents has led some writers to reject the whole
story. This argumentum ex silentio has, however, been met by M. Paul
Sabatier, who in his critical edition of the "Tractatus de Indulgentia"
of Fra Bartholi has adduced all the really credible evidence in its
favour. But even those who regard the granting of this Indulgence as
traditionally believed to be an established fact of history, admit that
its early history is uncertain. (See PORTIUNCULA.)
The first
general chapter of the Friars Minor was held in May, 1217, at Porziuncola,
the order being divided into provinces, and an apportionment made of
the Christian world into so many Franciscan missions. Tuscany, Lombardy,
Provence, Spain, and Germany were assigned to five of Francis's principal
followers; for himself the saint reserved France, and he actually set
out for that kingdom, but on arriving at Florence, was dissuaded from
going further by Cardinal Ugolino, who had been made protector of the
order in 1216. He therefore sent in his stead Brother Pacificus, who
in the world had been renowned as a poet, together with Brother Agnellus,
who later on established the Friars Minor in England. Although success
came indeed to Francis and his friars, with it came also opposition,
and it was with a view to allaying any prejudices the Curia might have
imbibed against their methods that Francis, at the instance of Cardinal
Ugolino, went to Rome and preached before the pope and cardinals in
the Lateran. This visit to the Eternal City, which took place 1217-18,
was apparently the occasion of Francis's memorable meeting with St.
Dominic. The year 1218 Francis devoted to missionary tours in Italy,
which were a continual triumph for him. He usually preached out of doors,
in the market-places, from church steps, from the walls of castle court-yards.
Allured by the magic spell of his presence, admiring crowds, unused
for the rest to anything like popular preaching in the vernacular, followed
Francis from place to place hanging on his lips; church bells rang at
his approach; processions of clergy and people advanced to meet him
with music and singing; they brought the sick to him to bless and heal,
and kissed the very ground on which he trod, and even sought to cut
away pieces of his tunic. The extraordinary enthusiasm with which the
saint was everywhere welcomed was equalled only by the immediate and
visible result of his preaching. His exhortations of the people, for
sermons they can hardly be called, short, homely, affectionate, and
pathetic, touched even the hardest and most frivolous, and Francis became
in sooth a very conqueror of souls. Thus it happened, on one occasion,
while the saint was preaching at Camara, a small village near Assisi,
that the whole congregation were so moved by his "words of spirit
and life" that they presented themselves to him in a body and begged
to be admitted into his order. It was to accede, so far as might be,
to like requests that Francis devised his Third Order, as it is now
called, of the Brothers and Sisters of Penance, which he intended as
a sort of middle state between the world and the cloister for those
who could not leave their home or desert their wonted avocations in
order to enter either the First Order of Friars Minor or the Second
Order of Poor Ladies. That Francis prescribed particular duties for
these tertiaries is beyond question. They were not to carry arms, or
take oaths, or engage in lawsuits, etc. It is also said that he drew
up a formal rule for them, but it is clear that the rule, confirmed
by Nicholas IV in 1289, does not, at least in the form in which it has
come down to us, represent the original rule of the Brothers and Sisters
of Penance. In any event, it is customary to assign 1221 as the year
of the foundation of this third order, but the date is not certain.
At the
second general chapter (May, 1219) Francis, bent on realizing his project
of evangelizing the infidels, assigned a separate mission to each of
his foremost disciples, himself selecting the seat of war between the
crusaders and the Saracens. With eleven companions, including Brother
Illuminato and Peter of Cattaneo, Francis set sail from Ancona on 21
June, for Saint-Jean d'Acre, and he was present at the siege and taking
of Damietta. After preaching there to the assembled Christian forces,
Francis fearlessly passed over to the infidel camp, where he was taken
prisoner and led before the sultan. According to the testimony of Jacques
de Vitry, who was with the crusaders at Damietta, the sultan received
Francis with courtesy, but beyond obtaining a promise from this ruler
of more indulgent treatment for the Christian captives, the saint's
preaching seems to have effected little. Before returning to Europe,
the saint is believed to have visited Palestine and there obtained for
the friars the foothold they still retain as guardians of the holy places.
What is certain is that Francis was compelled to hasten back to Italy
because of various troubles that had arisen there during his absence.
News had reached him in the East that Matthew of Narni and Gregory of
Naples, the two vicars-general whom he had left in charge of the order,
had summoned a chapter which, among other innovations, sought to impose
new fasts upon the friars, more severe than the rule required. Moreover,
Cardinal Ugolino had conferred on the Poor Ladies a written rule which
was practically that of the Benedictine nuns, and Brother Philip, whom
Francis had charged with their interests, had accepted it. To make matters
worse, John of Capella, one of the saint's first companions, had assembled
a large number of lepers, both men and women, with a view to forming
them into a new religious order, and had set out for Rome to seek approval
for the rule he had drawn up for these unfortunates. Finally a rumour
had been spread abroad that Francis was dead, so that when the saint
returned to Italy with brother Elias -- he appeared to have arrived
at Venice in July, 1220 -- a general feeling of unrest prevailed among
the friars. Apart from these difficulties, the order was then passing
through a period of transition. It had become evident that the simple,
familiar, and unceremonious ways which had marked the Franciscan movement
at its beginning were gradually disappearing, and that the heroic poverty
practiced by Francis and his companions at the outset became less easy
as the friars with amazing rapidity increased in number. And this Francis
could not help seeing on his return. Cardinal Ugolino had already undertaken
the task "of reconciling inspirations so unstudied and so free
with an order of things they had outgrown." This remarkable man,
who afterwards ascended the papal throne as Gregory IX, was deeply attached
to Francis, whom he venerated as a saint and also, some writers tell
us, managed as an enthusiast. That Cardinal Ugolino had no small share
in bringing Francis's lofty ideals "within range and compass"
seems beyond dispute, and it is not difficult to recognize his hand
in the important changes made in the organization of the order in the
so-called Chapter of Mats.
At this
famous assembly, held at Porziuncola at Whitsuntide, 1220 or 1221 (there
is seemingly much room for doubt as to the exact date and number of
the early chapters), about 5000 friars are said to have been present,
besides some 500 applicants for admission to the order. Huts of wattle
and mud afforded shelter for this multitude. Francis had purposely made
no provision for them, but the charity of the neighbouring towns supplied
them with food, while knights and nobles waited upon them gladly. It
was on this occasion that Francis, harassed no doubt and disheartened
at the tendency betrayed by a large number of the friars to relax the
rigours of the rule, according to the promptings of human prudence,
and feeling, perhaps unfitted for a place which now called largely for
organizing abilities, relinquished his position as general of the order
in favour of Peter of Cattaneo. But the latter died in less than a year,
being succeeded as vicar-general by the unhappy Brother Elias, who continued
in that office until the death of Francis. The saint, meanwhile, during
the few years that remained in him, sought to impress on the friars
by the silent teaching of personal example of what sort he would fain
have them to be. Already, while passing through Bologna on his return
from the East, Francis had refused to enter the convent there because
he had heard it called the "House of the Friars" and because
a studium had been instituted there. He moreover bade all the friars,
even those who were ill, quit it at once, and it was only some time
after, when Cardinal Ugolino had publicly declared the house to be his
own property, that Francis suffered his brethren to re-enter it. Yet
strong and definite as the saint's convictions were, and determinedly
as his line was taken, he was never a slave to a theory in regard to
the observances of poverty or anything else; about him indeed, there
was nothing narrow or fanatical. As for his attitude towards study,
Francis desiderated for his friars only such theological knowledge as
was conformable to the mission of the order, which was before all else
a mission of example. Hence he regarded the accumulation of books as
being at variance with the poverty his friars professed, and he resisted
the eager desire for mere book-learning, so prevalent in his time, in
so far as it struck at the roots of that simplicity which entered so
largely into the essence of his life and ideal and threatened to stifle
the spirit of prayer, which he accounted preferable to all the rest.
In 1221,
so some writers tell us, Francis drew up a new rule for the Friars Minor.
Others regard this so-called Rule of 1221 not as a new rule, but as
the first one which Innocent had orally approved; not, indeed, its original
form, which we do not possess, but with such additions and modifications
as it has suffered during the course of twelve years. However this may
be, the composition called by some the Rule of 1221 is very unlike any
conventional rule ever made. It was too lengthy and unprecise to become
a formal rule, and two years later Francis retired to Fonte Colombo,
a hermitage near Rieti, and rewrote the rule in more compendious form.
This revised draft he entrusted to Brother Elias, who not long after
declared he had lost it through negligence. Francis thereupon returned
to the solitude of Fonte Colombo, and recast the rule on the same lines
as before, its twenty-three chapters being reduced to twelve and some
of its precepts being modified in certain details at the instance of
Cardinal Ugolino. In this form the rule was solemnly approved by Honorius
III, 29 November, 1223 (Litt. "Solet annuere"). This Second
Rule, as it is usually called or Regula Bullata of the Friars Minor,
is the one ever since professed throughout the First Order of St. Francis
(see RULE OF SAINT FRANCIS). It is based on the three vows of obedience,
poverty, and chastity, special stress however being laid on poverty,
which Francis sought to make the special characteristic of his order,
and which became the sign to be contradicted. This vow of absolute poverty
in the first and second orders and the reconciliation of the religious
with the secular state in the Third Order of Penance are the chief novelties
introduced by Francis in monastic regulation.
It was
during Christmastide of this year (1223) that the saint conceived the
idea of celebrating the Nativity "in a new manner", by reproducing
in a church at Greccio the praesepio of Bethlehem, and he has thus come
to be regarded as having inaugurated the population devotion of the
Crib. Christmas appears indeed to have been the favourite feast of Francis,
and he wished to persuade the emperor to make a special law that men
should then provide well for the birds and the beasts, as well as for
the poor, so that all might have occasion to rejoice in the Lord.
Early
in August, 1224, Francis retired with three companions to "that
rugged rock 'twixt Tiber and Arno", as Dante called La Verna, there
to keep a forty days fast in preparation for Michaelmas. During this
retreat the sufferings of Christ became more than ever the burden of
his meditations; into few souls, perhaps, had the full meaning of the
Passion so deeply entered. It was on or about the feast of the Exaltation
of the Cross (14 September) while praying on the mountainside, that
he beheld the marvellous vision of the seraph, as a sequel of which
there appeared on his body the visible marks of the five wounds of the
Crucified which, says an early writer, had long since been impressed
upon his heart. Brother Leo, who was with St. Francis when he received
the stigmata, has left us in his note to the saint's autograph blessing,
preserved at Assisi, a clear and simple account of the miracle, which
for the rest is better attested than many another historical fact. The
saint's right side is described as bearing on open wound which looked
as if made by a lance, while through his hands and feet were black nails
of flesh, the points of which were bent backward. After the reception
of the stigmata, Francis suffered increasing pains throughout his frail
body, already broken by continual mortification. For, condescending
as the saint always was to the weaknesses of others, he was ever so
unsparing towards himself that at the last he felt constrained to ask
pardon of "Brother Ass", as he called his body, for having
treated it so harshly. Worn out, moreover, as Francis now was by eighteen
years of unremitting toil, his strength gave way completely, and at
times his eyesight so far failed him that he was almost wholly blind.
During an access of anguish, Francis paid a last visit to St. Clare
at St. Damian's, and it was in a little hut of reeds, made for him in
the garden there, that the saint composed that "Canticle of the
Sun", in which his poetic genius expands itself so gloriously.
This was in September, 1225. Not long afterwards Francis, at the urgent
instance of Brother Elias, underwent an unsuccessful operation for the
eyes, at Rieti. He seems to have passed the winter 1225-26 at Siena,
whither he had been taken for further medical treatment. In April, 1226,
during an interval of improvement, Francis was moved to Cortona, and
it is believed to have been while resting at the hermitage of the Celle
there, that the saint dictated his testament, which he describes as
a "reminder, a warning, and an exhortation". In this touching
document Francis, writing from the fullness of his heart, urges anew
with the simple eloquence, the few, but clearly defined, principles
that were to guide his followers, implicit obedience to superiors as
holding the place of God, literal observance of the rule "without
gloss", especially as regards poverty, and the duty of manual labor,
being solemnly enjoined on all the friars. Meanwhile alarming dropsical
symptoms had developed, and it was in a dying condition that Francis
set out for Assisi. A roundabout route was taken by the little caravan
that escorted him, for it was feared to follow the direct road lest
the saucy Perugians should attempt to carry Francis off by force so
that he might die in their city, which would thus enter into possession
of his coveted relics. It was therefore under a strong guard that Francis,
in July, 1226, was finally borne in safety to the bishop's palace in
his native city amid the enthusiastic rejoicings of the entire populace.
In the early autumn Francis, feeling the hand of death upon him, was
carried to his beloved Porziuncola, that he might breathe his last sigh
where his vocation had been revealed to him and whence his order had
struggled into sight. On the way thither he asked to be set down, and
with painful effort he invoked a beautiful blessing on Assisi, which,
however, his eyes could no longer discern. The saint's last days were
passed at the Porziuncola in a tiny hut, near the chapel, that served
as an infirmary. The arrival there about this time of the Lady Jacoba
of Settesoli, who had come with her two sons and a great retinue to
bid Francis farewell, caused some consternation, since women were forbidden
to enter the friary. But Francis in his tender gratitude to this Roman
noblewoman, made an exception in her favour, and "Brother Jacoba",
as Francis had named her on account of her fortitude, remained to the
last. On the eve of his death, the saint, in imitation of his Divine
Master, had bread brought to him and broken. This he distributed among
those present, blessing Bernard of Quintaville, his first companion,
Elias, his vicar, and all the others in order. "I have done my
part," he said next, "may Christ teach you to do yours."
Then wishing to give a last token of detachment and to show he no longer
had anything in common with the world, Francis removed his poor habit
and lay down on the bare ground, covered with a borrowed cloth, rejoicing
that he was able to keep faith with his Lady Poverty to the end. After
a while he asked to have read to him the Passion according to St. John,
and then in faltering tones he himself intoned Psalm cxli. At the concluding
verse, "Bring my soul out of prison", Francis was led away
from earth by "Sister Death", in whose praise he had shortly
before added a new strophe to his "Canticle of the Sun". It
was Saturday evening, 3 October, 1226, Francis being then in the forty-fifth
year of his age, and the twentieth from his perfect conversion to Christ.
The saint
had, in his humility, it is said, expressed a wish to be buried on the
Colle d'Inferno, a despised hill without Assisi, where criminals were
executed. However this may be, his body was, on 4 October, borne in
triumphant procession to the city, a halt being made at St. Damian's,
that St. Clare and her companions might venerate the sacred stigmata
now visible to all, and it was placed provisionally in the church of
St. George (now within the enclosure of the monastery of St. Clare),
where the saint had learned to read and had first preached. Many miracles
are recorded to have taken place at his tomb. Francis was canonized
at St. George's by Gregory IX, 16 July, 1228. On that day following
the pope laid the first stone of the great double church of St. Francis,
erected in honour of the new saint, and thither on 25 May, 1230, Francis's
remains were secretly transferred by Brother Elias and buried far down
under the high altar in the lower church. Here, after lying hidden for
six centuries, like that of St. Clare's, Francis's coffin was found,
12 December, 1818, as a result of a toilsome search lasting fifty-two
nights. This discovery of the saint's body is commemorated in the order
by a special office on 12 December, and that of his translation by another
on 25 May. His feast is kept throughout the Church on 4 October, and
the impression of the stigmata on his body is celebrated on 17 September.
It has
been said with pardonable warmth that Francis entered into glory in
his lifetime, and that he is the one saint whom all succeeding generations
have agreed in canonizing. Certain it is that those also who care little
about the order he founded, and who have but scant sympathy with the
Church to which he ever gave his devout allegiance, even those who know
that Christianity to be Divine, find themselves, instinctively as it
were, looking across the ages for guidance to the wonderful Umbrian
Poverello, and invoking his name in grateful remembrance. This unique
position Francis doubtless owes in no small measure to his singularly
lovable and winsome personality. Few saints ever exhaled "the good
odour of Christ" to such a degree as he. There was about Francis,
moreover, a chivalry and a poetry which gave to his other-worldliness
a quite romantic charm and beauty. Other saints have seemed entirely
dead to the world around them, but Francis was ever thoroughly in touch
with the spirit of the age. He delighted in the songs of Provence, rejoiced
in the new-born freedom of his native city, and cherished what Dante
calls the pleasant sound of his dear land. And this exquisite human
element in Francis's character was the key to that far-reaching, all-embracing
sympathy, which may be almost called his characteristic gift. In his
heart, as an old chronicler puts it, the whole world found refuge, the
poor, the sick and the fallen being the objects of his solicitude in
a more special manner. Heedless as Francis ever was of the world's judgments
in his own regard, it was always his constant care to respect the opinions
of all and to wound the feelings of none. Wherefore he admonishes the
friars to use only low and mean tables, so that "if a beggar were
to come to sit down near them he might believe that he was but with
his equals and need not blush on account of his poverty." One night,
we are told, the friary was aroused by the cry "I am dying."
"Who are you", exclaimed Francis arising, "and why are
dying?" "I am dying of hunger", answered the voice of
one who had been too prone to fasting. Whereupon Francis had a table
laid out and sat down beside the famished friar, and lest the latter
might be ashamed to eat alone, ordered all the other brethren to join
in the repast. Francis's devotedness in consoling the afflicted made
him so condescending that he shrank not from abiding with the lepers
in their loathly lazar-houses and from eating with them out of the same
platter. But above all it is his dealings with the erring that reveal
the truly Christian spirit of his charity. "Saintlier than any
of the saint", writes Celano, "among sinners he was as one
of themselves". Writing to a certain minister in the order, Francis
says: "Should there be a brother anywhere in the world who has
sinned, no matter how great soever his fault may be, let him not go
away after he has once seen thy face without showing pity towards him;
and if he seek not mercy, ask him if he does not desire it. And by this
I will know if you love God and me." Again, to medieval notions
of justice the evil-doer was beyond the law and there was no need to
keep faith with him. But according to Francis, not only was justice
due even to evil-doers, but justice must be preceded by courtesy as
by a herald. Courtesy, indeed, in the saint's quaint concept, was the
younger sister of charity and one of the qualities of God Himself, Who
"of His courtesy", he declares, "gives His sun and His
rain to the just and the unjust". This habit of courtesy Francis
ever sought to enjoin on his disciples. "Whoever may come to us",
he writes, "whether a friend or a foe, a thief or a robber, let
him be kindly received", and the feast which he spread for the
starving brigands in the forest at Monte Casale sufficed to show that
"as he taught so he wrought". The very animals found in Francis
a tender friend and protector; thus we find him pleading with the people
of Gubbio to feed the fierce wolf that had ravished their flocks, because
through hunger "Brother Wolf" had done this wrong. And the
early legends have left us many an idyllic picture of how beasts and
birds alike susceptible to the charm of Francis's gentle ways, entered
into loving companionship with him; how the hunted leveret sought to
attract his notice; how the half-frozen bees crawled towards him in
the winter to be fed; how the wild falcon fluttered around him; how
the nightingale sang with him in sweetest content in the ilex grove
at the Carceri, and how his "little brethren the birds" listened
so devoutly to his sermon by the roadside near Bevagna that Francis
chided himself for not having thought of preaching to them before. Francis's
love of nature also stands out in bold relief in the world he moved
in. He delighted to commune with the wild flowers, the crystal spring,
and the friendly fire, and to greet the sun as it rose upon the fair
Umbrian vale. In this respect, indeed, St. Francis's "gift of sympathy"
seems to have been wider even than St. Paul's, for we find no evidence
in the great Apostle of a love for nature or for animals.
Hardly
less engaging than his boundless sense of fellow-feeling was Francis's
downright sincerity and artless simplicity. "Dearly beloved,"
he once began a sermon following upon a severe illness, "I have
to confess to God and you that during this Lent I have eaten cakes made
with lard." And when the guardian insisted for the sake of warmth
upon Francis having a fox skin sewn under his worn-out tunic, the saint
consented only upon condition that another skin of the same size be
sewn outside. For it was his singular study never to hide from men that
which known to God. "What a man is in the sight of God," he
was wont to repeat, "so much he is and no more" -- a saying
which passed into the "Imitation", and has been often quoted.
Another winning trait of Francis which inspires the deepest affection
was his unswerving directness of purpose and unfaltering following after
an ideal. "His dearest desire so long as he lived", Celano
tells us, "was ever to seek among wise and simple, perfect and
imperfect, the means to walk in the way of truth." To Francis love
was the truest of all truths; hence his deep sense of personal responsibility
towards his fellows. The love of Christ and Him Crucified permeated
the whole life and character of Francis, and he placed the chief hope
of redemption and redress for a suffering humanity in the literal imitation
of his Divine Master. The saint imitated the example of Christ as literally
as it was in him to do so; barefoot, and in absolute poverty, he proclaimed
the reign of love. This heroic imitation of Christ's poverty was perhaps
the distinctive mark of Francis's vocation, and he was undoubtedly,
as Bossuet expresses it, the most ardent, enthusiastic, and desperate
lover of poverty the world has yet seen. After money Francis most detested
discord and divisions. Peace, therefore, became his watchword, and the
pathetic reconciliation he effected in his last days between the Bishop
and Potesta of Assisi is bit one instance out of many of his power to
quell the storms of passion and restore tranquility to hearts torn asunder
by civil strife. The duty of a servant of God, Francis declared, was
to lift up the hearts of men and move them to spiritual gladness. Hence
it was not "from monastic stalls or with the careful irresponsibility
of the enclosed student" that the saint and his followers addressed
the people; "they dwelt among them and grappled with the evils
of the system under which the people groaned". They worked in return
for their fare, doing for the lowest the most menial labour, and speaking
to the poorest words of hope such as the world had not heard for many
a day. In this wise Francis bridged the chasm between an aristocratic
clergy and the common people, and though he taught no new doctrine,
he so far repopularized the old one given on the Mount that the Gospel
took on a new life and called forth a new love.
Such
in briefest outline are some of the salient features which render the
figure of Francis one of such supreme attraction that all manner of
men feel themselves drawn towards him, with a sense of personal attachment.
Few, however, of those who feel the charm of Francis's personality may
follow the saint to his lonely height of rapt communion with God. For,
however engaging a "minstrel of the Lord", Francis was none
the less a profound mystic in the truest sense of the word. The whole
world was to him one luminous ladder, mounting upon the rungs of which
he approached and beheld God. It is very misleading, however, to portray
Francis as living "at a height where dogma ceases to exist",
and still further from the truth to represent the trend of his teaching
as one in which orthodoxy is made subservient to "humanitarianism".
A very cursory inquiry into Francis's religious belief suffices to show
that it embraced the entire Catholic dogma, nothing more or less. If
then the saint's sermons were on the whole moral rather than doctrinal,
it was less because he preached to meet the wants of his day, and those
whom he addressed had not strayed from dogmatic truth; they were still
"hearers", if not "doers", of the Word. For this
reason Francis set aside all questions more theoretical than practical,
and returned to the Gospel.
Again,
to see in Francis only the loving friend of all God's creatures, the
joyous singer of nature, is to overlook altogether that aspect of his
work which is the explanation of all the rest -- its supernatural side.
Few lives have been more wholly imbued with the supernatural, as even
Renan admits. Nowhere, perhaps, can there be found a keener insight
into the innermost world of spirit, yet so closely were the supernatural
and the natural blended in Francis, that his very asceticism was often
clothed in the guide of romance, as witness his wooing the Lady Poverty,
in a sense that almost ceased to be figurative. For Francis's singularly
vivid imagination was impregnate with the imagery of the chanson de
geste, and owing to his markedly dramatic tendency, he delighted in
suiting his action to his thought. So, too, the saint's native turn
for the picturesque led him to unite religion and nature. He found in
all created things, however trivial, some reflection of the Divine perfection,
and he loved to admire in them the beauty, power, wisdom, and goodness
of their Creator. And so it came to pass that he saw sermons even in
stones, and good in everything. Moreover, Francis's simple, childlike
nature fastened on the thought, that if all are from one Father then
all are real kin. Hence his custom of claiming brotherhood with all
manner of animate and inanimate objects. The personification, therefore,
of the elements in the "Canticle of the Sun" is something
more than a mere literary figure. Francis's love of creatures was not
simply the offspring of a soft or sentimental disposition; it arose
rather from that deep and abiding sense of the presence of God, which
underlay all he said and did. Even so, Francis's habitual cheerfulness
was not that of a careless nature, or of one untouched by sorrow. None
witnessed Francis's hidden struggles, his long agonies of tears, or
his secret wrestlings in prayer. And if we meet him making dumb-show
of music, by playing a couple of sticks like a violin to give vent to
his glee, we also find him heart-sore with foreboding at the dire dissensions
in the order which threatened to make shipwreck of his ideal. Nor were
temptations or other weakening maladies of the soul wanting to the saint
at any time. Francis's lightsomeness had its source in that entire surrender
of everything present and passing, in which he had found the interior
liberty of the children of God; it drew its strength from his intimate
union with Jesus in the Holy Communion. The mystery of the Holy Eucharist,
being an extension of the Passion, held a preponderant place in the
life of Francis, and he had nothing more at heart than all that concerned
the cultus of the Blessed Sacrament. Hence we not only hear of Francis
conjuring the clergy to show befitting respect for everything connected
with the Sacrifice of the Mass, but we also see him sweeping out poor
churches, questing sacred vessels for them, and providing them with
altar-breads made by himself. So great, indeed, was Francis's reverence
for the priesthood, because of its relation to the Adorable Sacrament,
that in his humility he never dared to aspire to that dignity. Humility
was, no doubt, the saint's ruling virtue. The idol of an enthusiastic
popular devotion, he ever truly believed himself less than the least.
Equally admirable was Francis's prompt and docile obedience to the voice
of grace within him, even in the early days of his ill-defined ambition,
when the spirit of interpretation failed him. Later on, the saint, with
as clear as a sense of his message as any prophet ever had, yielded
ungrudging submission to what constituted ecclesiastical authority.
No reformer, moreover, was ever, less aggressive than Francis. His apostolate
embodied the very noblest spirit of reform; he strove to correct abuses
by holding up an ideal. He stretched out his arms in yearning towards
those who longed for the "better gifts". The others he left
alone.
And thus,
without strife or schism, God's Poor Little Man of Assisi became the
means of renewing the youth of the Church and of imitating the most
potent and popular religious movement since the beginnings of Christianity.
No doubt this movement had its social as well as its religious side.
That the Third Order of St. Francis went far towards re-Christianizing
medieval society is a matter of history. However, Francis's foremost
aim was a religious one. To rekindle the love of God in the world and
reanimate the life of the spirit in the hearts of men -- such was his
mission. But because St. Francis sought first the Kingdom of God and
His justice, many other things were added unto him. And his own exquisite
Franciscan spirit, as it is called, passing out into the wide world,
became an abiding source of inspiration. Perhaps it savours of exaggeration
to say, as has been said, that "all the threads of civilization
in the subsequent centuries seem to hark back to Francis", and
that since his day "the character of the whole Roman Catholic Church
is visibly Umbrian". It would be difficult, none the less, to overestimate
the effect produced by Francis upon the mind of his time, or the quickening
power he wielded on the generations which have succeeded him. To mention
two aspects only of his all-pervading influence, Francis must surely
be reckoned among those to whom the world of art and letters is deeply
indebted. Prose, as Arnold observes, could not satisfy the saint's ardent
soul, so he made poetry. He was, indeed, too little versed in the laws
of composition to advance far in that direction. But his was the first
cry of a nascent poetry which found its highest expression in the "Divine
Comedy"; wherefore Francis has been styled the precursor of Dante.
What the saint did was to teach a people "accustomed to the artificial
versification of courtly Latin and Provencal poets, the use of their
native tongue in simple spontaneous hymns, which became even more popular
with the Laudi and Cantici of his poet-follower Jacopone of Todi".
In so far, moreover, as Francis's repraesentatio, as Salimbene calls
it, of the stable at Bethlehem is the first mystery-play we hear of
in Italy, he is said to have borne a part in the revival of the drama.
However this may be, if Francis's love of song called forth the beginnings
of Italian verse, his life no less brought about the birth of Italian
art. His story, says Ruskin, became a passionate tradition painted everywhere
with delight. Full of colour, dramatic possibilities, and human interest,
the early Franciscan legend afforded the most popular material for painters
since the life of Christ. No sooner, indeed did Francis's figure make
an appearance in art than it became at once a favourite subject, especially
with the mystical Umbrian School. So true is this that it has been said
we might by following his familiar figure "construct a history
of Christian art, from the predecessors of Cimabue down to Guido Reni,
Rubens, and Van Dyck".
Probably
the oldest likeness of Francis that has come down to us is that preserved
in the Sacro Speco at Subiaco. It is said that it was painted by a Benedictine
monk during the saint's visit there, which may have been in 1218. The
absence of the stigmata, halo, and title of saint in this fresco form
its chief claim to be considered a contemporary picture; it is not,
however, a real portrait in the modern sense of the word, and we are
dependent for the traditional presentment of Francis rather on artists'
ideals, like the Della Robbia statue at the Porziuncola, which is surely
the saint's vera effigies, as no Byzantine so-called portrait can ever
be, and the graphic description of Francis given by Celano (Vita Prima,
c.lxxxiii). Of less than middle height, we are told, and frail in form,
Francis had a long yet cheerful face and soft but strong voice, small
brilliant black eyes, dark brown hair, and a sparse beard. His person
was in no way imposing, yet there was about the saint a delicacy, grace,
and distinction which made him most attractive.
The literary
materials for the history of St. Francis are more than usually copious
and authentic. There are indeed few if any medieval lives more thoroughly
documented. We have in the first place the saint's own writings. These
are not voluminous and were never written with a view to setting forth
his ideas systematically, yet they bear the stamp of his personality
and are marked by the same unvarying features of his preaching. A few
leading thoughts taken "from the words of the Lord" seemed
to him all sufficing, and these he repeats again and again, adapting
them to the needs of the different persons whom he addresses. Short,
simple, and informal, Francis's writings breathe the unstudied love
of the Gospel and enforce the same practical morality, while they abound
in allegories and personification and reveal an intimate interweaving
of Biblical phraseology. Not all the saint's writings have come down
to us, and not a few of these formerly attributed to him are now with
greater likelihood ascribed to others. The extant and authentic opuscula
of Francis comprise, besides the rule of the Friars Minor and some fragments
of the other Seraphic legislation, several letters, including one addressed
"to all the Christians who dwell in the whole world," a series
of spiritual counsels addressed to his disciples, the "Laudes Creaturarum"
or "Canticle of the Sun", and some lesser praises, an Office
of the Passion compiled for his own use, and few other orisons which
show us Francis even as Celano saw him, "not so much a man's praying
as prayer itself". In addition to the saint's writings the sources
of the history of Francis include a number of early papal bulls and
some other diplomatic documents, as they are called, bearing upon his
life and work. Then come the biographies properly so called. These include
the lives written 1229-1247 by Thomas of Celano, one of Francis's followers;
a joint narrative of his life compiled by Leo, Rufinus, and Angelus,
intimate companions of the saint, in 1246; and the celebrated legend
of St. Bonaventure, which appeared about 1263; besides a somewhat more
polemic legend called the "Speculum Perfectionis", attributed
to Brother Leo, the state of which is a matter of controversy. There
are also several important thirteenth-century chronicles of the order,
like those of Jordan, Eccleston, and Bernard of Besse, and not a few
later works, such as the "Chronica XXIV. Generalium" and the
"Liber de Conformitate", which are in some sort a continuation
of them. It is upon these works that all the later biographies of Francis's
life are based.
Recent
years have witnessed a truly remarkable upgrowth of interest in the
life and work of St. Francis, more especially among non-Catholics, and
Assisi has become in consequence the goal of a new race of pilgrims.
This interest, for the most part literary and academic, is centered
mainly in the study of the primitive documents relating to the saint's
history and the beginnings of the Franciscan Order. Although inaugurated
some years earlier, this movement received its greatest impulse from
the publication in 1894 of Paul Sabatier's "Vie de S. François",
a work which was almost simultaneously crowned by the French Academy
and place upon the Index. In spite of the author's entire lack of sympathy
with the saint's religious standpoint, his biography of Francis bespeaks
vast erudition, deep research, and rare critical insight, and it has
opened up a new era in the study of Franciscan resources. To further
this study an International Society of Franciscan Studies was founded
at Assisi in 1902, the aim of which is to collect a complete library
of works on Franciscan history and to compile a catalogue of scattered
Franciscan manuscripts; several periodicals, devoted to Franciscan documents
and discussions exclusively, have moreover been established in different
countries. Although a large literature has grown up around the figure
of the Poverello within a short time, nothing new of essential value
has been added to what was already known of the saint. The energetic
research work of recent years has resulted in the recovery of several
important early texts, and has called forth many really fine critical
studies dealing with the sources, but the most welcome feature of the
modern interest in Franciscan origins has been the careful re-editing
and translating of Francis's own writings and of nearly all the contemporary
manuscript authorities bearing on his life. Not a few of the controverted
questions connected therewith are of considerable import, even to those
not especially students of the Franciscan legend, but they could not
be made intelligible within the limits of the present article. It must
suffice, moreover, to indicate only some of the chief works on the life
of St. Francis.
Saint Francis is
called the little poor man of Assisi. He was born in the year 1182 in
the town of Assisi in Italy. His father's name was Bernadone. Bernadone
was a very wealthy merchant of Assisi. Francis was a very good-looking
boy. He was merry and soft-hearted. So he had many friends. All the
noble men's sons were his companions.
Francis was brought
up in luxury and gaiety. He spent a considerable portion of his wealth
in extravagant pleasures. He used to drink with the young princes of
the land.
One day Francis
was joking and laughing with his friends. A beggar came along crying
for alms. Francis, who was soft-hearted, gave whatever he had in his
pocket to the beggar. His companions mocked at him for his charitable
act. Dispassion dawned in his heart. The sight of the beggar set him
thinking about the poverty and misery of mundane life. He gave much
money to the poor. His father thought that Francis was wasting his money
and rebuked him.
Sometime after this,
Francis was laid up in bed for many months on account of some serious
disease. He was about to die. But the Lord saved him as he had to carry
out a definite mission in his life. The nature of Francis was entirely
changed. Francis prayed to the Lord for light and guidance as to his
future. He had a vision of Lord Jesus. He made a strong determination
to renounce his old way of living to tread a life of purity and to dedicate
his life to the service of humanity.
As soon as Francis
got well, he informed his parents of his determination. They were disappointed.
They became angry with Francis. Francis gave up his old ways and habits
and set up to serve God. He distributed clothes, goods and money to
the poor. His father was very much annoyed towards his son. He said,
"Is this the gratitude you show to me ? I laboured hard and amassed
wealth. You are lavishly wasting it on these miserable wretches".
Francis' friends
mocked at him and teased him. His father turned him out of the house.
Francis lived like a beggar. His old friends even pelted him with stones
and mud. He bore everything with patience. He wore a coarse dress and
ate simple food.
Francis lived in
a cave in the mountains of Assisi and spent his time in prayer and meditation
for two years. Some kind people gave him food, but very often he had
to starve.
Francis called
the body 'brother ass'. He kept this brother ass under perfect discipline
and control. Sometimes he kept this brother ass without food and water
and denied it some special food that it liked very much.
Francis was humble.
He loved God's creatures. He loved birds and beasts. He loved the depressed
and the outcastes. He treated the birds, the beasts and all beings as
brothers and sisters.
Francis went from
village to village preaching the love of God. He invited people to join
him in his life of service if they were willing. Bernard, a rich man
of Assisi, was very much attracted by the saintliness of Francis. He
joined Francis. He was the first follower of Francis. He placed all
his wealth at the altar of God. Eleven others also joined Francis. They
distributed all their wealth to the poor. Francis and his followers
went all over Italy preaching, teaching, healing and blessing wherever
they went.
The gospel of kindness
and love of Francis soon spread all over Europe and earned for him the
name of St. Francis. People called him the little poor man of Assisi.
He lived for ever in the hearts of all men.
St. Francis collected
many followers and founded the Order of Mendicant Friars or Franciscans.
The members of this Order have to take a vow of poverty, chastity, love
and obedience.
St. Francis gave
up his mortal coil in 1228.
The followers of St. Francis built a beautiful church round him on the
hill of Assisi, the hill he so dearly loved. The influence of St. Francis
and the sweet aroma of the life he lived will last for ever.
Glory to St. Francis, the little poor man of Assisi, but an illustrious
saint !
The Prayer of Saint
Francis
"O Lord, make me an instrument of Thy Peace!
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is discord, harmony;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light, and
Where there is sorrow, joy.
Oh Divine Master, grant that I may not
so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand; to be loved
as to love; for it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life."
"The simple
prayer of St. Francis of Assisi provides for us a mold in which to cast
our own life's conduct and character. It provides a blueprint upon which
to pattern our living in our thoughts, speech and actions within our
day to day relationships with our fellow beings and with all life around
us. Therefore, the prayer of St. Francis is a precious document for
us, an indispensable, invaluable frame of reference by which to judge
our own lives, and referring to which we can do the necessary to bring
about the needed alterations and modifications for the upliftment and
purification of our own daily life."
- Sri Swami Chidananda
Saint Francis of
Assisi (born in Assisi, Italy, ca. 1182; died there on October 3, 1226)
founded the Franciscan Order or "Friars Minor". He is the
patron saint of animals and the environment.
Boyhood and early
manhood
Born Giovanni Bernardone, commonly known as Francesco. His father, Pietro,
was a wealthy cloth merchant. Of his mother, Pica, little is known.
Francis was one of several children.
The name of Francesco
("the French-man"), by which his baptismal name was soon altogether
replaced, has many conflicting explanations to its origin. One claims
it to have been given him soon after his birth by his father, returning
to Assisi from a trip to France; according to another account it was
due to his early acquisition of the French language (possibly because
his mother is believed to have been French). But perhaps the most probable
explanation comes from his infatuation with French literature, particularly
with the Troubadors. It is interesting to note the similarity between
the lifestyle of the troubadors, free of all worldly possessions, the
antithesis of the life his father wanted for him --and that which he
would one day follow himself in his ministry.
Rebellious toward
his father's business and pursuit of wealth, Francis would spend most
of his youth lost in books (ironically his father's wealth did afford
his son an excellent education, and he became fluent in reading several
languages including Latin). He was also known for drinking and enjoying
the company of his many friends, who were usually the sons of nobles.
His displays of disillusionment toward the world that surrounded him
became evident fairly early, one of which is shown in the story of the
beggar. In this account, he found himself yet again out having fun with
his friends one day when a beggar came along and asked for alms. While
his friends ignored the beggar's cries, Francis gave the man everything
he had in his pockets. His friends quickly chided and mocked him for
his stupidity, and when he got home, his father scolded him in a rage.
In 1201 he joined
a military expedition against Perugia, was taken prisoner, and spent
a year as a captive. It is probable that his conversion to more serious
thoughts was a gradual process relating to this experience.
It is said that
when he began to avoid the sports of his former companions, and they
asked him laughingly if he was thinking of marrying, he answered "Yes,
a fairer bride than any you have ever seen" - meaning his "lady
poverty", as he afterward used to say.
He spent much time
in lonely places, asking God for enlightenment. By degrees he took to
nursing the most repulsive victims in the lazar houses near Assisi.
After a pilgrimage
to Rome, where he begged at the church doors for the poor, he had a
vision in which he heard a voice calling upon him to restore the Church
of God which had fallen into decay. He thought this to mean the ruined
church of St. Damian near Assisi and sold his horse together with some
cloth from his father's store, giving the proceeds to the priest for
this purpose.
Pietro, highly indignant,
attempted to bring him to his senses, first with threats and then with
corporal chastisement. After a final interview in the presence of the
bishop, Francis renounced all expectations from his father, laying aside
even the garments received from him, and for a while was a homeless
wanderer in the hills around Assisi.
Returning to the
town where he spent two years this time, he restored several ruined
churches, among them the little chapel of St. Mary of the Angels, just
outside the town, which later became his favorite abode.
The beginning of
the Brotherhood
At the end of this period (according to Jordanus , in 1209), a sermon
which he heard on the Gospel of Matthew 10:9, where Christ tells his
followers that they should go forth and proclaim that the kingdom of
heaven is upon them, and that they should take no money with them, that
they should take no walking stick for the road, and that they should
wear no shoes -- made such an impression on him that he decided to devote
himself wholly to a life of apostolic poverty.
Clad in a rough
garment, barefoot, and, after the Evangelical precept, without staff
or scrip, he began to preach repentance. He was soon joined by a prominent
fellow townsman, Bernardo di Quintavalle , who contributed all that
he had to the work, and by other companions, who are said to have reached
the number of eleven within a year, whom he called the "fratres
minores", in Latin, "the little brothers". The Franciscans
are sometimes called Friars, and this is a term derived from "fratres",
or "brothers" in Latin.
The brothers lived
in the deserted lazar house of Rivo Torto near Assisi; but they spent
much of their time traveling through the mountainous districts of Umbria,
always cheerful and full of songs, yet making a deep impression on their
hearers by their earnest exhortations.
Their life was
extremely ascetic, though such practises were apparently not prescribed
by the first rule which Francis gave them (probably as early as 1209),
which seems to have been nothing more than a collection of Scriptural
passages emphasizing the duty of poverty.
In 1209 Francis
led his followers to Rome and asked the Pope's permission to found a
new religious order. In spite of the obvious similarity between Francis'
principles and the fundamental ideas of the followers of Peter Waldo
whose similar request had previously been rejected by the Pope, the
brotherhood of Assisi succeeded in gaining the approval of Pope Innocent
III. The reason for this unlikely approval is because after the Pope's
rejection of Waldo, his group had paradoxically become more popular
than ever. Realizing this, the Pope wished to avoid repeating that mistake
in an attempt to fight heresy, which had become an increasing problem
for the Church. Therefore, the Pope believed he could prevent the spread
of the Franciscans, or at least control it, by granting them official
recognition.
Many legends have clustered around the decisive audience of Francis
with the Pope. The account in Matthew of Paris, according to which the
Pope originally sent the shabby saint off to keep swine, and only recognized
his real worth by his ready obedience, has, in spite of its improbability,
a certain historical interest, since it shows the natural antipathy
of the older Benedictine monasticism to the plebeian mendicant orders.
Work and extension
of the Brotherhood
It was not, however, a life of idle mendicancy into which the brothers
entered when they set out in 1210 with the papal approbation, but one
of diligent labor. Their work embraced devoted service in the abodes
of sickness and poverty, earnest preaching by both priests and lay brothers,
and missions in an ever widening circle, which finally included heretics
and muslims.
They came together
every year at Pentecost in the little church of the Portiuncula at Assisi,
to report on their experiences and strengthen themselves for fresh efforts.
There is considerable
uncertainty as to the chronological and historical details of the last
fifteen years of the founder's life.
But to these years
belong the accounts of the origin of the first houses in Perugia, Cortona,
Pisa, Florence, and elsewhere (1211-1213); the first attempts at a Muslim
mission, in the sending of five brothers, soon to be martyrs, to Morocco,
as well as in a journey undertaken by Francis himself to Spain, from
which he was forced by illness to return without accomplishing his objective;
the first settlements in the Spanish peninsula and in France; and the
attempts, unsuccessful at first, to gain a foothold in Germany. The
alleged meeting of Francis and St. Dominic in Rome at the time of the
Fourth Council of the Lateran (1215) belongs to the domain of legend;
even Sabatier's argument to show that such a meeting actually took place
in 1218 is open to serious objection.
Historical in the
main are the accounts relating to the journey of Francis to Egypt and
Palestine, during the Fifth Crusade, where he attempted to convert the
Sultan Al-Kamil and gave fearless proofs of his readiness to suffer
for his faith; the internal discord, which he found existing in the
order on his return to Italy in 1220; the origin of his second and considerably
enlarged rule, which was replaced two years later by the final form,
drawn up by Cardinal Ugolino ; and possibly the granting by Pope Honorius
III (in 1223) of the Indulgence of the Portiuncula - a document which
Sabatier, who formerly rejected it, later pronounced authentic.
The last years
Francis had to suffer from the dissensions just alluded to and the transformation
which they produced in the originally simple constitution of the brotherhood,
making it a regular order under strict supervision from Rome.
Especially after
Cardinal Ugolino had been assigned as protector of the order by Honorius
III - it is said, at Francis' own request - he saw himself forced further
and further away from his original plan. Even the independent direction
of his brotherhood was, it seems, finally withdrawn from him; at least
after about 1223 it was practically in the hands of Brother Elias of
Crotona, an ambitious politician who seconded the attempts of the cardinal-protector
to transform the character of the order.
However, in the
external successes of the brothers, as they were reported at the yearly
general chapters, there was much to encourage Francis. Caesarius of
Speyer , the first German provincial, a zealous advocate of the founder's
strict principle of poverty, began in 1221 from Augsburg, with twenty-five
companions, to win for the order some lands watered by the Rhine and
the Danube; and a few years later the Franciscan propaganda, starting
from Cambridge, embraced the principal towns of England.
But none of these
cheering reports could wholly drive away from the mind of Francis the
gloom which covered his last years.
He spent much of
his time in solitude, praying or singing praise to God for his wonderful
works. The canticle known as Laudes creaturarum, with its childlike
invocations to Brother Sun, Sister Moon with the stars, Brother Wind,
Sister Water, Brother Fire, and finally Sister Death, to raise their
voices to the glory of God (influenced by The Prayer of Azariah and
Song of the Three Holy Children), dates from this period of his life.
The hermit stage
which opened the career of many monastic founders was reserved for the
end of his, who had once been so restless in his activity.
He spent the short
remainder of his life partly on Monte Alverno on the upper Arno, where
he fasted forty days and longed for union with God, to be demonstrated
by the impression on his body of the wounds of Christ (see Stigmata);
partly at Rieti under medical treatment; and partly in his beloved Portiuncula
at Assisi waiting for his deliverance from the flesh. It is believed
by some historians that his last days drew huge crowds of people wanting
to bask in his presence, as well as those who awaited his death for
the dividing up of his body for the purpose of relics.
He died October
3, 1226, at Assisi, and was canonized two years later by Pope Gregory
IX, the former cardinal-protector of the order.
As patron saint
of the environment
Legend has it that St. Francis preached to the birds and other creatures
as well as to humans. He is known today as the patron saint of animals
and the environment. His image is often placed in gardens in respect
for his interest in all things natural. His feast day is October 4.