Life of St. Francis of Assisi
caves, they were able for a few days to listen only to the inner voice.
These little hermitages, sufficiently isolated to secure them from
disturbance, but near enough to the cities to permit their going thither
to preach, may be found wherever Francis went. They form, as it were, a
series of documents about his life quite as important as the written
witnesses. Something of his soul may still be found in these caverns in
the Apennine forests. He never separated the contemplative from the
active life. A precious witness to this fact is found in the
regulations for the brethren during their sojourn in hermitage.[10]
The return of the Brothers to Rivo-Torto was marked by a vast increase
of popularity. The prejudiced attacks to which they had formerly been
subjected were lost in a chorus of praises. Perhaps men suspected the
ill-will of the bishop and were happy to see him checked. However this
may be, a lively feeling of sympathy and admiration was awakened; the
people recalled to mind the indifference manifested by the son of
Bernardone a few months before with regard to Otho IV. going to be
crowned at Rome. The emperor had made a progress through Italy with a
numerous suite and a pomp designed to produce an effect on the minds of
the populace; but not only had Francis not interrupted his work to go
and see him, he had enjoined upon his friars also to abstain from going,
and had merely selected one of them to carry to the monarch a reminder
of the ephemeral nature of worldly glory. Later on it was held that he
had predicted to the emperor his approaching excommunication.
This spirited attitude made a vivid impression on the popular
imagination.[11] Perhaps it was of more service in forming general
opinion than anything he had done thus far. The masses, who are not
often alive to delicate sentiments, respond quickly to those who,
whether rightly or wrongly, do not bow down before power. This time they
perceived that where other men would see the poor, the rich, the noble,
the common, the learned, Francis saw only souls, which were to him the
more precious as they were more neglected or despised.
No biographer informs us how long the Penitents remained at Rivo-Torto.
It seems probable, however, that they spent there the latter part of
1210 and the early months of 1211, evangelizing the towns and villages
of the neighborhood.
They suffered much; this part of the plain of Assisi is inundated by
torrents nearly every autumn, and many times the poor friars, blockaded
in the lazaretto, were forced to satisfy their hunger with a few roots
from the neighboring fields.
The barrack in which they lived was so narrow that, when they were all
there at once, they had much difficulty not to crowd one another. To
secure to each one his due quota of space, Francis wrote the name of
each brother upon the column which supports the building. But these
minor discomforts in no sense disturbed their happiness. No apprehension
had as yet come to cloud Francis's hopes; he was overflowing with joy
and kindliness; all the memories which Rivo-Torto has left with the
Order are fresh and sweet pictures of him.[12]
One night all the brethren seemed to be sleeping, when he heard a
moaning. It was one of his sheep, to speak after the manner of the
Franciscan biographer, who had denied himself too rigorously and was
dying of hunger. Francis immediately rose, called the brother to him,
brought forth the meagre reserve of food, and himself began to eat to
inspire the other with courage, explaining to him that if penitence is
good it is still necessary to temper it with discretion.[13]
Francis had that tact of the heart which divines the secrets of others
and anticipates their desires. At another time, still at Rivo-Torto, he
took a sick brother by the hand, led him to a grape-vine, and,
presenting him with a fine cluster, began himself to eat of it. It was
nothing, but the simple act so bound to him the sick man's heart that
many years after the brother could not speak of it without emotion.[14]
But Francis was far from neglecting his mission. Ever growing more sure,
not of himself but of his duty toward men, he took part in the political
and social affairs of his province with the confidence of an upright and
pure heart, never able to understand how stupidity, perverseness, pride,
and indolence, by leaguing themselves together, may check the finest and
most righteous impulses. He had the faith which removes mountains, and
was wholly free from that touch of scepticism, so common in our day,
which points out that it is of no more use to move mountains than to
change the place of difficulties.
When the people of Assisi learned that his Rule had been approved by the
pope there was strong excitement; every one desired to hear him preach.
The clergy were obliged to give way; they offered him the Church of St.
George, but this church was manifestly insufficient for the crowds of
hearers; it was necessary to open the cathedral to him.
St. Francis never said anything especially new; to win hearts he had
that which is worth more than any arts of oratory--an ardent conviction;
he spoke as compelled by the imperious need of kindling others with the
flame that burned within himself. When they heard him recall the horrors
of war, the crimes of the populace, the laxity of the great, the
rapacity which dishonored the Church, the age-long widowhood of
Poverty, each one felt himself taken to task in his own conscience.
An attentive or excited crowd is always very impressionable, but this
peculiar sensitiveness was perhaps stronger in the Middle Ages than at
any other time. Nervous disturbances were in the air, and upon men thus
prepared the will of the preacher impressed itself in a manner almost
magnetic.
To understand what Francis's preaching must have been like we must
forget the manners of to-day, and transport ourselves for a moment to
the Cathedral of Assisi in the thirteenth century; it is still standing,
but the centuries have given to its stones a fine rust of polished
bronze, which recalls Venice and Titian's tones of ruddy gold. It was
new then, and all sparkling with whiteness, with the fine rosy tinge of
the stones of Mount Subasio. It had been built by the people of Assisi a
few years before in one of those outbursts of faith and union which were
almost everywhere the prelude of the communal movement. So, when the
people thronged into it on their high days, they not merely had none of
that vague respect for a holy place which, though it has passed into the
customs of other countries, still continues to be unknown in Italy, but
they felt themselves at home in a palace which they had built for
themselves. More than in any other church they there felt themselves at
liberty to criticise the preacher, and they had no hesitation in proving
to him, either by murmurs of dissatisfaction or by applause, just what
they thought of his words. We must remember also that the churches of
Italy have neither pews nor chairs, that one must listen standing or
kneeling, while the preacher walks about gesticulating on a platform;
add to this the general curiosity, the clamorous sympathies of many, the
disguised opposition of some, and we shall have a vague notion of the
conditions under which Francis first entered the pulpit of San Rufino.
His success was startling. The poor felt that they had found a friend, a
brother, a champion, almost an avenger. The thoughts which they hardly
dared murmur beneath their breath Francis proclaimed at the top of his
voice, daring to bid all, without distinction, to repent and love one
another. His words were a cry of the heart, an appeal to the consciences
of all his fellow-citizens, almost recalling the passionate utterances
of the prophets of Israel. Like those witnesses for Jehovah the "little
poor man" of Assisi had put on sackcloth and ashes to denounce the
iniquities of his people, like theirs was his courage and heroism, like
theirs the divine tenderness in his heart.
It seemed as if Assisi were about to recover again the feeling of Israel
for sin. The effect of these appeals was prodigious; the entire
population was thrilled, conquered, desiring in future to live only
according to Francis's counsels; his very companions, who had remained
behind at Rivo-Torto, hearing of these marvels, felt in themselves an
answering thrill, and their vocation took on a new strength; during the
night they seemed to see their master in a chariot of fire, soaring to
heaven like a new Elijah.[15]
This almost delirious enthusiasm of a whole people was not perhaps so
difficult to arouse as might be supposed: the emotional power of the
masses was at that time as great all over Europe as it was in Paris
during certain days of the Revolution. We all know the tragic and
touching story of those companies of children from the north of Europe
who appeared in 1212 in troops of several thousands, boys and girls
mingled together pell-mell. Nothing could stop them, a mania had
overtaken them, in all good faith they believed that they were to
deliver the Holy Land, that the sea would be dried up to let them pass.
They perished, we hardly know how, perhaps being sold into slavery.[16]
They were accounted martyrs, and rightly; popular devotion likened them
to the Holy Innocents, dying for a God whom they knew not. Those
children of the crusade also perished for an unknown ideal, false no
doubt; but is it not better to die for an unknown and even a false ideal
than to live for the vain realities of an utterly unpoetic existence? In
the end of time we shall be judged neither by philosophers nor by
theologians, and if we were, it is to be hoped that even in this case
love would cover a multitude of sins and pass by many follies.
Certainly if ever there was a time when religious affections of the
nerves were to be dreaded, it was that which produced such movements as
these. All Europe seemed to be beside itself; women appeared stark naked
in the streets of towns and villages, slowly walking up and down, silent
as phantoms.[17] We can understand now the accounts which have come
down to us, so fantastic at the first glance, of certain popular orators
of this time; of Berthold of Ratisbon, for example, who drew together
crowds of sixteen thousand persons, or of that Fra Giovanni Schio di
Vicenza, who for a time quieted all Northern Italy and brought Guelphs
and Ghibellines into one another's arms.[18]
That popular eloquence which was to accomplish so many marvels in 1233
comes down in a straight line from the Franciscan movement. It was St.
Francis who set the example of those open-air sermons given in the
vulgar tongue, at street corners, in public squares, in the fields.
To feel the change which he brought about we must read the sermons of
his contemporaries; declamatory, scholastic, subtile, they delighted in
the minutiae of exegesis or dogma, serving up refined dissertations on
the most obscure texts of the Old Testament, to hearers starving for a
simple and wholesome diet.
With Francis, on the contrary, all is incisive, clear, practical. He
pays no attention to the precepts of the rhetoricians, he forgets
himself completely, thinking only of the end desired, the conversion of
souls. And conversion was not in his view something vague and
indistinct, which must take place only between God and the hearer. No,
he will have immediate and practical proofs of conversion. Men must give
up ill-gotten gains, renounce their enmities, be reconciled with their
adversaries.
At Assisi he threw himself valiantly into the thick of civil
dissensions. The agreement of 1202 between the parties who divided the
city had been wholly ephemeral. The common people were continually