Life of St. Francis of Assisi
exemplari_. This, therefore, is the letter given by Wadding
xiii., but without address or salutation.
[34] We need not despair of finding them. The archives of the
monasteries of Clarisses are usually rudimentary enough, but
they are preserved with pious care.
[35] _Spec._, 117b; _Conform._, 185a 1; 135b, 1. Cf. _Test. B.
Clarae_, A. SS., Aug., ii., p. 747.
[36] This story is given in the _Spec._, 128b, as from
eye-witnesses. Cf. _Conform._, 184b, 1; 203a, 1.
[37] 1 Cel., 106. These recommendations as to Portiuncula were
amplified by the Zelanti, when, under the generalship of
Crescentius (Bull _Is qui ecclesiam_, March 6, 1245), the
Basilica of Assisi was substituted for Santa Maria degli Angeli
as _mater et caput_ of the Order. Vide _Spec._, 32b, 69b-71a;
_Conform._, 144a, 2; 218a, 1; 3 Soc., 56; 2 Cel., 1, 12 and 13;
Bon., 24, 25; see the Appendix, the Study of the Indulgence of
August 2.
[38] 2 Cel., 108. As will be seen (below, p. 367) the remainder
of Celano's narrative seems to require to be taken with some
reserve. Cf. _Spec._, 115b; _Conform._, 225a, 2; Bon., 211.
[39] _Non sum cuculus_, in Italian _cuculo_.
[40] _Spec._, 136b; _Fior. iv. consid._ It is to be noted that
Guido, instead of waiting at Assisi for the certainly impending
death of Francis, went away to Mont Gargano. 2 Cel., 3, 142.
* * * * *
CHAPTER XX
FRANCIS'S WILL AND DEATH
End of September-October 3, 1226
The last days of Francis's life are of radiant beauty. He went to meet
death, singing,[1] says Thomas of Celano, summing up the impression of
those who saw him then.
To be once more at Portiuncula after so long a detention at the bishop's
palace was not only a real joy to his heart, but the pure air of the
forest must have been much to his physical well-being; does not the
Canticle of the Creatures seem to have been made expressly to be sung in
the evening of one of those autumn days of Umbria, so soft and luminous,
when all nature seems to retire into herself to sing her own hymn of
love to Brother Sun?
We see that Francis has come to that almost entire cessation of pain,
that renewing of life, which so often precedes the approach of the last
catastrophe.
He took advantage of it to dictate his Will.[2]
It is to these pages that we must go to find the true note for a sketch
of the life of its author, and an idea of the Order as it was in his
dreams.
In this record, which is of an incontestable authenticity, the most
solemn manifestation of his thought, the Poverello reveals himself
absolutely, with a virginal candor.
His humility is here of a sincerity which strikes one with awe; it is
absolute, though no one could dream that it was exaggerated. And yet,
wherever his mission is concerned, he speaks with tranquil and serene
assurance. Is he not an ambassador of God? Does he not hold his message
from Christ himself? The genesis of his thought here shows itself to be
at once wholly divine and entirely personal. The individual conscience
here proclaims its sovereign authority. "No one showed me what I ought
to do, but the Most High himself revealed to me that I ought to live
conformably to his holy gospel."
When a man has once spoken thus, submission to the Church has been
singularly encroached upon. We may love her, hearken to her, venerate
her, but we feel ourselves, perhaps without daring to avow it, superior
to her. Let a critical hour come, and one finds himself heretic without
knowing it or wishing it.
"Ah, yes," cries Angelo Clareno, "St. Francis promised to obey the pope
and his successors, but they cannot and must not command anything
contrary to the conscience or to the Rule."[3]
For him, as for all the spiritual Franciscans, when there is conflict
between what the inward voice of God ordains and what the Church wills,
he has only to obey the former.[4]
If you tell him that the Church and the Order are there to define the
true signification of the Rule, he appeals to common sense, and to that
interior certitude which is given by a clear view of truth.
The Rule, as also the gospel, of which it is a summary, is above all
ecclesiastical power, and no one has the right to say the last word in
their interpretation.[5]
The Will was not slow to gain a moral authority superior even to that of
the Rule. Giovanni of Parma, to explain the predilection of the
Joachimites for this document, points out that after the impression of
the stigmata the Holy Spirit was in Francis with still greater plenitude
than before.[6]
Did the innumerable sects which disturbed the Church in the thirteenth
century perceive that these two writings--the Rule and the
Testament--the one apparently made to follow and support the other,
substantially identical as it was said, proceeded from two opposite
inspirations? Very confusedly, no doubt, but guided by a very sure
instinct, they saw in these pages the banner of liberty.
They were not mistaken. Even to-day, thinkers, moralists, mystics may
arrive at solutions very different from those of the Umbrian prophet,
but the method which they employ is his, and they may not refuse to
acknowledge in him the precursor of religious subjectivism.
The Church, too, was not mistaken. She immediately understood the spirit
that animated these pages.
Four years later, perhaps to the very day, September 28, 1230, Ugolini,
then Gregory IX., solemnly interpreted the Rule, in spite of the
precautions of Francis, who had forbidden all gloss or commentary on the
Rule or the Will, and declared that the Brothers were not bound to the
observation of the Will.[7]
What shall we say of the bull in which the pope alleges his familiar
relations with the Saint to justify his commentary, and in which the
clearest passages are so distorted as to change their sense completely.
"One is stupefied," cries Ubertini of Casali, "that a text so clear
should have need of a commentary, for it suffices to have common sense
and to know grammar in order to understand it." And this strange monk
dares to add: "There is one miracle which God himself cannot do; it is
to make two contradictory things true."[8]
Certainly the Church should be mistress in her own house; it would have
been nothing wrong had Gregory IX. created an Order conformed to his
views and ideas, but when we go through Sbaralea's folios and the
thousands of bulls accorded to the spiritual sons of him who in the
clearest and most solemn manner had forbidden them to ask any privilege
of the court of Rome, we cannot but feel a bitter sadness.
Thus upheld by the papacy, the Brothers of the Common Observance made
the Zelanti sharply expiate their attachment to Francis's last requests.
Caesar of Speyer died of violence from the Brother placed in charge of
him;[9] the first disciple, Bernardo di Quintavalle, hunted like a
wild beast, passed two years in the forests of Monte-Sefro, hidden by a
wood-cutter;[10] the other first companions who did not succeed in
flight had to undergo the severest usage. In the March of Ancona, the
home of the Spirituals, the victorious party used a terrible violence.
The Will was confiscated and destroyed; they went so far as to burn it
over the head of a friar who persisted in desiring to observe it.[11]
WILL (LITERAL TRANSLATION).
See in what manner God gave it to me, to me, Brother Francis, to
begin to do penitence; when I lived in sin, it was very painful
to me to see lepers, but God himself led me into their midst,
and I remained here a little while.[12] When I left them, that
which had seemed to me bitter had become sweet and easy.
A little while after I quitted the world, and God gave me such a
faith in his churches that I would kneel down with simplicity
and I would say: "We adore thee, Lord Jesus Christ, here and in
all thy churches which are in the world, and we bless thee that
by thy holy cross thou hast ransomed the world."
Besides, the Lord gave me and still gives me so great a faith in
priests who live according to the form of the holy Roman Church,
because of their sacerdotal character, that even if they
persecuted me I would have recourse to them. And even though I
had all the wisdom of Solomon, if I should find poor secular
priests, I would not preach in their parishes without their
consent. I desire to respect them like all the others, to love
them and honor them as my lords. I will not consider their
sins, for in them I see the Son of God and they are my lords. I
do this because here below I see nothing, I perceive nothing
corporally of the most high Son of God, if not his most holy
Body and Blood, which they receive and they alone distribute to
others. I desire above all things to honor and venerate all
these most holy mysteries and to keep them precious. Whenever I
find the sacred names of Jesus or his words in indecent places,
I desire to take them away, and I pray that others take them
away and put them in some decent place. We ought to honor and
revere all the theologians and those who preach the most holy
word of God, as dispensing to us spirit and life.
When the Lord gave me some brothers no one showed me what I
ought to do, but the Most High himself revealed to me that I
ought to live according to the model of the holy gospel. I
caused a short and simple formula to be written, and the lord
pope confirmed it for me.
Those who presented themselves to observe this kind of life
distributed all that they might have to the poor. They contented
themselves with a tunic, patched within and without, with the
cord and breeches, and we desired to have nothing more.
The clerks said the office like other clerks, and the laymen
_Pater noster_.
We loved to live in poor and abandoned churches, and we were
ignorant and submissive to all. I worked with my hands and would
continue to do, and I will also that all other friars work at
some honorable trade. Let those who have none learn one, not for
the purpose of receiving the price of their toil, but for their
good example and to flee idleness. And when they do not give us
the price of the work, let us resort to the table of the Lord,
begging our bread from door to door. The Lord revealed to me the
salutation which we ought to give: "God give you peace!"
Let the Brothers take great care not to receive churches,
habitations, and all that men build for them, except as all is
in accordance with the holy poverty which we have vowed in the
Rule, and let them not receive hospitality in them except as
strangers and pilgrims.
I absolutely interdict all the brothers, in whatever place they
may be found, from asking any bull from the court of Rome,
whether directly or indirectly, under pretext of church or
convent or under pretext of preachings, nor even for their
personal protection. If they are not received anywhere let them
go elsewhere, thus doing penance with the benediction of God.
I desire to obey the minister-general of this fraternity, and
the guardian whom he may please to give me. I desire to put
myself entirely into his hands, to go nowhere and do nothing
against his will, for he is my lord.
Though I be simple and ill, I would, however, have always a
clerk who will perform the office, as it is said in the Rule;
let all the other brothers also be careful to obey their
guardians and to do the office according to the Rule. If it come