Life of St. Francis of Assisi
of England, published by Th. Wright, London, 8vo, 1893; _Poesies
populaires latines du moyen age_, du Meril, Paris, 1847. See
also Raynouard, _Lexique roman_, i., 446, 451, 464, the fine
poems of the troubadour Pierre Cardinal, contemporary of St.
Francis, upon the woes of the Church, and Dante, _Inferno_, xix.
If one would gain an idea of what the bishop of a small city in
those days cost his flock, he has only to read the bull of
February 12, 1219, _Justis petentium_, addressed by Honorius
III. to the Bishop of Terni, and including the contract by which
the inhabitants of that city settled the revenues of the
episcopal see. Horoy, t. iii., col. 114, or the _Bullarium
romanum_, t. iii., p. 348, Turin.
[7] _Conosco sacerdoti che fanno gli usura per formare un
patrimonio da lasciare ai loro spurii; altri che tengono osteria
coll' insegna del collare e vendono vino_ ... Salimbene,
Cantarelli, Parma, 1882, 2 vols., 8vo, ii., p. 307.
[8] Vide _Brevis historia Prior._ _Grandimont.--Stephani
Tornacensis._ Epist. 115, 152, 153, 156, 162; Honorius III.,
Horoy's edition, lib. i., 280, 284, 286-288; ii., 12, 130, 136,
383-387.
[9] Guerard, _Cartulaire de N. D. de Paris_, t. i., p. cxi; t.
ii., p. 406. Cf. Honorius III., Bull _Inter statuta_ of July 25,
1223, Horoy, t. iv., col. 401. See also canon 23 of the Council
of Beziers, 1233; Guibert de Gemblours, _epist._ 5 and 6
(Migne); Honorius III., lib. ix., 32, 81; ii., 193; iv., 10;
iii., 253 and 258; iv., 33, 27, 70, 144; v., 56, 291, 420, 430;
vi., 214, 132, 139, 204; vii., 127; ix., 51.
[10] Vide Bull _Postquam vocante Domino_ of July 11, 1206.
Potthast 2840.
[11] V. _Annales Stadenses_ [_Monumenta Germaniae historica,
Scriptorum_, t. 16], _ad ann. 1237_. Among the comprehensive
pictures of the situation of the Church in the thirteenth
century, there is none more interesting than that left us by the
Cardinal Jacques de Vitry in his _Historia occidentalis: Libri
duo quorum prior Orientalis, alter Occidentalis historiae nomine
inscribitur Duaci_, 1597, 16mo. pp. 259-480.
[12] V. Honorius III., Horoy's edition, lib. i., ep. 109, 125,
135, 206, 273; ii., 128, 164; iv., 120, etc.
[13] _Dialogus miraculorum_ of Cesar of Heisterbach [Strange's
edition, Cologne, 1851, 2 vols., 8vo], t. ii., pp. 255 and 125.
This book, with the Golden Legend of Giacomo di Varaggio, gives
the best idea of the state of religious thought in the
thirteenth century.
[14] _Recueil des historiens de France._ Bouquet, t. xii., pp.
550, 551.
[15] Bonacorsi: _Vitae haereticorum_ [d'Achery, _Spicilegium_, t.
i., p. 215] Cf. Lucius III., epist. 171, Migne.
[16] Vide Bernard Gui, _Practica inquisitionis_, Douai edition,
4to, Paris, 1886 p. 244 ff., and especially the Vatican MS.,
2548, folio 71.
[17] A chronicle of St. Francis's time makes this same
comparison: Burchard, Abbot of Urspurg ([Cross] 1226) [_Burchardi et
Cuonradi chronicon. Monum. Germ. hist. Script._, t. 23], has
left us an account of the approbation of Francis by the Pope,
all the more precious for being that of a contemporary. _Loc.
cit._, p. 376.
[18] _De nugis Curialium_, Dist. 1, cap. 31, p. 64, Wright's
edition. Cf. _Chronique de Laon_, Bouquet xiii., p. 680.
[19] See, for example, the letter of the Italian branch of the
Poor Men of Lyons [_Pauperos Lombardi_] to their brethren of
Germany, there called Leonistes. In it they show the points in
which they are not in harmony with the French Waldenses.
Published by Preger: _Abhandlungen der K. bayer. Akademie der
Wiss. Hist. Cl._, t. xiii., 1875, p. 19 ff.
[20] These continual journeyings sometimes gained for them the
name of _Passagieni_, as in the south of France the preachers of
certain sects are to-day called _Courriers_. The term, however,
specially designates a Judaizing sect who returned to the
literal observation of the Mosaic law: Doellinger, _Beitraege_, t.
ii., pp. 327 and 375. They should therefore be identified with
the _Circonsisi_ of the constitution of Frederic II.
(Huillard-Breholles, t. v., p. 280). See especially the fine
monograph of M. C. Molinier: _Memoires de l'Academie de
Toulouse_, 1888.
[21] A. SS., Aprilis, t. iii., p. 238d.
[22] I would say that between the inspiration of Francis and the
Catharian doctrines there is an irreconcilable opposition; but
it would not be difficult to find acts and words of his which
recall the contempt for matter of the Cathari; for example, his
way of treating his body. Some of his counsels to the friars:
_Unusquisque habet in potestate sua inimicum suum videlicit
corpus, per quod peccat._ Assisi MS. 338, folio 20b. Conform.
138, b. 2.--_Cum majorem inimicum corpore non habeam._ 2 Cel.,
3, 63. These are momentary but inevitable obscurations, moments
of forgetfulness, of discouragement, when a man is not himself,
and repeats mechanically what he hears said around him. The real
St. Francis is, on the contrary, the lover of nature, he who
sees in the whole creation the work of divine goodness, the
radiance of the eternal beauty, he who, in the Canticle of the
Creatures, sees in the body not the Enemy but a brother: _Caepit
hilariter loqui ad corpus; Gaude, frater corpus._ 2 Cel., 3,
137.
[23] _Quodam die, dicta fabrissa dixit ipsi testi praegnanti,
quod rogaret Deum, ut liberaret eam a Daemone, quem habebat in
ventre ... Gulielmus dixit quod ita magnum peccatum erat jacere
cum uxore sua quam cum concubina._ Doellinger, _loc. cit._, pp.
24, 35.
[24] Those of the _Concorrezenses_ and _Bajolenses_. In Italy
_Cathari_ becomes _Gazzari_; for that matter, each country had
its special appellatives; one of the most general in the north
was that of the _Bulgari_, which marks the oriental origin of
the sect, whence the slang term Boulgres and its derivatives
(vide Matthew Paris, ann. 1238). Cf. Schmit, _Histoire des
Cathares_, 8vo, 2 vols, Paris, 1849.
[25] The most current name in Italy was that of the _Patarini_,
given them no doubt from their inhabiting the quarter of
second-hand dealers in Milan: _la contrada dei Patari_, found in
many cities. _Patari!_ is still the cry of the ragpickers in the
small towns of Provence. In the thirteenth century Patarino and
Catharo were synonyms. But before that the term Patarini had an
entirely different sense. See the very remarkable study of M.
Felice Tocco on this subject in his _Eresia net medio evo_,
12mo, Florence, 1884.
[26] Cesar von Heisterbach, _Dial. mirac._, t. i., p. 309,
Strange's edition.
[27] _Innocentii opera_, Migne, t. i., col. 537; t. ii., 654.
[28] _Computruistis in peccatis sicut jumenta in stercore suo ut
fumus ac fimus putrefactionis vestrae jam fere circumadjacentes
regionis infecerit, ac ipsum Dominum ut credimus ad nauseam
provocaverit._ _Loc. cit._, col. 654. Cf. 673; Potthast, 2532,
2539.
[29] _Gesta Innocentii_, Migne, t. i., col. clxii. Cf. _epist._
viii., 85 and 105.
[30] Campi, _Historia Ecclesiastica di Piacenza_, parte ii., p.
92 ff. Cf. _Innoc., epist._ ix., 131, 166-169; x., 54, 64, 222.
[31] A. SS., Maii, t. v., p. 87.
[32] Bull of June 6, 1205, Potthast, 2237; Migne, vii., 83. This
Cardinal Leo (of the presbyterial title of Holy Cross of
Jerusalem) was one most valued by Innocent III. To him and
Ugolini, the future Gregory IX., he at this epoch confided the
most delicate missions (for example, in 1209, they were named
legates to Otho IV.). This embassy shows in what importance the
pope held the affairs of Assisi, though it was a very small
city.
[33] Not once do we find him fighting heretics. The early
Dominicans, on the contrary, are incessantly occupied with
arguing. See 2 Cel., 3, 46.
[34] It need not be said that I do not assert that no trace of
it is to be found after the ministry of St. Francis, but it was
no longer a force, and no longer endangered the very existence
of the Church.
[35] This strange personality will charm historians and
philosophers for a long while to come. I know nothing more
learned or more luminous than M. Felice Tocco's fine study in
his _Eresia nel medio evo_, Florence, 1884, 1 vol., 12mo, pp.
261-409.
[36] A. SS., Sept., t. vii., p. 283 ff.
[37] A. SS., Maii, vii.; Vincent de Beauvais, _Speculum
historiale_, _lib._ 29, _cap._ 40. La Sila is a wooded mountain,
situated eastward from Cosenza, which the peasants call _Monte
Nero_. The summits are nearly 2,000 metres above the sea.
[38] Toward 1195. Gioacchino died there, March 30, 1202.
[39] A whole apochryphal literature has blossomed out around
Gioacchino; certain hypercritics have tried to prove that he
never wrote anything. These are exaggerations. Three large works
are certainly authentic: _The Agreement of the Old and New
Testaments_, _The Commentary on the Apocalypse_, and _The
Psaltery of Ten Strings_, published in Venice, the first in
1517, the two others in 1527. His prophecies were so well known,
even in his lifetime, that an English Cistercian, Rudolph, Abbot
of Coggeshall ([Cross] 1228), coming to Rome in 1195, sought a
conference with him and has left us an interesting account of
it. Martene, _Amplissima Collectio_, t. v., p. 839.
[40] _Comm. in apoc._, folio 78, b. 2.
[41] _Qui vere monachus est nihil reputat esse suum nisi
citharam:_ Apoc., ib., folio 183. a. 2.
[42] E. Roth, _Die Visionen der heiligen Elisabeth von Schoenau_:
Bruenn, 1884, pp. 115-117.
* * * * *
CHAPTER IV
STRUGGLES AND TRIUMPH
Spring of 1206-February 24, 1209
The biographies of St. Francis have preserved to us an incident which
shows how great was the religious ferment even in the little city of
Assisi. A stranger was seen to go up and down the streets saying to
every one he met, "Peace and welfare!" (_Pax et bonum._)[1] He thus
expressed in his own way the disquietude of those hearts which could
neither resign themselves to perpetual warfare nor to the disappearance
of faith and love; artless echo, vibrating in response to the hopes and
fears that were shaking all Europe!
_"Vox clamantis in deserto!"_ it will be said. No, for every heart-cry
leaves its trace even when it seems to be uttered in empty air, and that
of the Unknown of Assisi may have contributed in some measure to
Francis's definitive call.
Since his abrupt return from Spoleto, life in his father's house had
become daily more difficult. Bernardone's self-love had received from
his son's discomfiture such a wound as with commonplace men is never
healed. He might provide, without counting it, money to be swallowed up
in dissipation, that so his son might stand on an equal footing with the
young nobles; he could never resign himself to see him giving with
lavish hands to every beggar in the streets.
Francis, continually plunged in reverie and spending his days in lonely