Life of St. Francis of Assisi
everything to defend their convictions. One day the poor-box was found
shattered by Brother Leo and his friends.[6]
To this degree of intensity the struggle had arrived. At this crisis the
first legend appeared.
II. First Life by Thomas of Celano[7]
Thomas of Celano, in writing this legend, to which he was later to
return for its completion, obeyed an express order of Pope Gregory
IX.[8]
Why did he not apply to one of the Brothers of the Saint's immediate
circle? The talent of this author might explain this choice, but
besides the fact that literary considerations would in this case hold a
secondary place, Brother Leo and several others proved later that they
also knew how to handle the pen.
If Celano was put in trust with the official biography, it is because,
being equally in sympathy with Gregory IX. and Brother Elias, his
absence had kept him out of the conflicts which had marked the last
years of Francis's life. Of an irenic temper, he belonged to the
category of those souls who easily persuade themselves that obedience is
the first of virtues, that every superior is a saint; and if unluckily
he is not, that we should none the less act as though he were.
We have some knowledge of his life. A native of Celano in the Abruzzi,
he discreetly observes that his family was noble, even adding, with a
touch of artless simplicity, that the master had a peculiar regard for
noble and educated Brothers. He entered the Order about 1215,[9] on
the return of Francis from Spain.
At the chapter of 1221 Caesar of Speyer, charged with the mission to
Germany, took him among those who were to accompany him.[10] In 1223 he
was named custode of Mayence, Worms, Cologne, and Speyer. In April of
the same year, when Caesar returned to Italy, devoured with the longing
to see St. Francis again, he commissioned Celano to execute his
functions until the arrival of the new provincial.[11]
We have no information as to where he was after the chapter-general held
at Speyer September 8, 1223. He must have been in Assisi in 1228, for
his account of the canonization is that of an eye-witness. He was there
again in 1230, and doubtless clothed with an important office, since he
could commit to Brother Giordano the relics of St. Francis.[12]
Written in a pleasing style, very often poetic, his work breathes an
affecting admiration for his hero; his testimony at once makes itself
felt as sincere and true: when he is partial it is without intention and
even without his knowledge. The weak point in this biography is the
picture which it outlines of the relations between Brother Elias and the
founder of the Order: from the chapters devoted to the last two years we
receive a very clear impression that Elias was named by Francis to
succeed him.[13]
Now if we reflect that at the time when Celano wrote, Giovanni Parenti
was minister-general, we at once perceive the bearing of these
indications.[14] Every opportunity is seized to give a preponderating
importance to Elias.[15] It is a true manifesto in his favor.
Have we reason to blame Celano? I think not. We must simply remember
that his work might with justice be called the legend of Gregory IX.
Elias was the pope's man, and the biography is worked up from the
information he gave. He could not avoid dwelling with peculiar
satisfaction upon his intimacy with Francis.
On the other hand, we cannot expect to find here such details as might
have sustained the pretension of the adversaries of Elias, those unruly
Zealots who were already proudly adorning themselves with the title of
_Companions of the Saint_ and endeavoring to constitute a sort of
spiritual aristocracy in the Order. Among them were four who during the
last two years had not, so to say, quitted Francis. We can imagine how
difficult it was not to speak of them. Celano carefully omits to mention
their names under pretext of sparing their modesty;[16] but by the
praises lavished upon Gregory IX., Brother Elias,[17] St. Clara,[18]
and even upon very secondary persons, he shows that his discretion is
far from being always so alert.
All this is very serious, but we must not exaggerate it. There is an
evident partiality, but it would be unjust to go farther and believe, as
men did later, that the last part of Francis's life was an active
struggle against the very person of Elias. A struggle there surely was,
but it was against tendencies whose spring Francis did not perceive. He
carried with him to his tomb his delusion as to his co-laborer.
For that matter this defect is after all secondary so far as the
physiognomy of Francis himself is concerned. In Celano's Life, as in the
Three Companions or the Fioretti, he appears with a smile for all joys,
and floods of tears for all woes; we feel everywhere the restrained
emotion of the writer; his heart is subjected by the moral beauty of his
hero.
III. SURVEY OF THE HISTORY OF THE ORDER FROM 1230-1244
When Thomas of Celano closed his legend he perceived more than anyone
the deficiencies of his work, for which he had been able to collect but
insufficient material.
Elias and the other Assisan brothers had told him of Francis's youth and
his activity in Umbria; but besides that he would have preferred,
whether from prudence or from love of peace, to keep silence upon
certain events,[19] there were long periods upon which he had not
received a single item of information.[20]
He therefore seems to indicate his intention of resuming and completing
his work.[21]
This is not the place to write the history of the Order, but a few facts
are necessary to put the documents into their proper surroundings.
Elected minister-general in 1232, Brother Elias took advantage of the
fact to labor with indomitable energy toward the realization of his own
ideas. In all the provinces new collections were organized for the
Basilica of Assisi, the work upon which was pushed with an activity
which however injured neither the strength of the edifice nor the
beauty of its details, which are as finished and perfect as those of any
monument in Europe.
We may conceive of the enormous sums which it had been necessary to
raise in order to complete such an enterprise in so short a time. More
than that, Brother Elias exacted absolute obedience from all his
subordinates; naming and removing the provincial ministers according to
his personal views, he neglected to convoke the chapter-general, and
sent his emissaries under the name of visitors into all the provinces to
secure the execution of his orders.
The moderate party in Germany, France, and England very soon found his
yoke insupportable. It was hard for them to be directed by an Italian
minister resident at Assisi, a small town quite aside from the highways
of civilization, entirely a stranger to the scientific movement
concentred in the universities of Oxford, Paris, and Bologna.
In the indignation of the _Zelanti_ against Elias and his contempt for
the Rule, they found a decisive support. Very soon the minister had for
his defence nothing but his own energy, and the favor of the pope and of
the few Italian moderates. By a great increase of vigilance and severity
he repressed several attempts at revolt.
His adversaries, however, succeeded in establishing secret intelligence
at the court of Rome; even the pope's confessor was gained; yet in spite
of all these circumstances, the success of the conspiracy was still
uncertain when the chapter of 1239 opened.
Gregory IX., still favorable to Elias,[22] presided. Fear gave sudden
courage to the conspirators; they threw their accusations in their
enemy's face.
Thomas of Eccleston gives a highly colored narrative of what took place.
Elias was proud, violent, even threatening. There were cries and
vociferations from both sides; they were about to come to blows when a
few words from the pope restored silence. He had made up his mind to
abandon his _protege_. He asked for his resignation. Elias indignantly
refused.
Gregory IX. then explained that in keeping him in charge he had thought
himself acting in accordance with the wishes of the majority: that he
had no intention to dominate the Order, and, since the Brothers no
longer desired Elias, he declared him deposed from the generalate.
The joy of the victors, says Eccleston, was immense and ineffable. They
chose Alberto di Pisa, provincial of England, to succeed him, and from
that time bent all their efforts to represent Elias as a creature of
Frederick II.[23] The former minister wrote indeed to the pope to
explain his conduct, but the letter did not reach its destination. It
must have reached the hands of his successor, and not been sent forward;
when Alberto of Pisa died it was found in his tunic.[24]
All the fury of the aged pontiff was unchained against Elias. One must
read the documents to see to what a height his anger could rise. The
friar retorted with a virulence which though less wordy was far more
overpowering.[25]
These events gained an indescribable notoriety[26] all over Europe and
threw the Order into profound disturbance. Many of the partisans of
Elias became convinced that they had been deceived by an impostor, and
they drew toward the group of Zealots, who never ceased to demand the
observance pure and simple of the Rule and the Will.
Thomas of Celano was of this number.[27] With profound sadness he saw
the innumerable influences that were secretly undermining the Franciscan
institute and menacing it with ruin. Already a refrain was going the
rounds of the convents, singing the victory of Paris over Assisi, that
is, of learning over poverty.
The Zealots gained new courage. Unaccustomed to the subtleties of
ecclesiastical politics, they did not perceive that the pope, while
condemning Brother Elias, had in nowise modified the general course
which he had marked out for the Order. The ministers-general, Alberto di
Pisa, 1239-1240, Aymon of Faversham, 1240-1244, Crescentius de Jesi,
1244-1247, were all, with different shades of meaning, representatives
of the moderate party.
Thomas of Celano's first legend had become impossible. The prominence
there given to Elias was almost a scandal. The necessity of working it
over and completing it became clearly evident at the chapter of Genoa
(1244).
All the Brothers who had anything to tell about Francis's life were
invited to commit it to writing and send it to the minister Crescentius
de Jesi.[28] The latter immediately caused a tract to be drawn up in
the form of a dialogue, commencing with the words: "_Venerabilium gesta
Patrum_." So soon after as the time of Bernard de Besse, only fragments
of this were left.[29]
But happily several of the works which saw the light in consequence of
the decision of this chapter have been preserved to us. It is to this
that we owe the Legend of the Three Companions and the Second Life by
Thomas of Celano.
IV. LEGEND OF THE THREE COMPANIONS[30]
The life of St. Francis which has come down to us under the name of the
Legend of the Three Companions was finished on August 11, 1246, in a
little convent in the vale of Rieti, which appears often in the course
of this history, that of Greccio. This hermitage had been Francis's
favorite abode, especially in the latter part of his life. He had thus
made it doubly dear to the hearts of his disciples.[31] It naturally
became, from the earliest days of the Order, the headquarters of the
Observants,[32] and it remains through all the centuries one of the
purest centres of Franciscan piety.
The authors of this legend were men worthy to tell St. Francis's story,
and perhaps the most capable of doing it: the friars Leo, Angelo, and
Rufino. All three had lived in intimacy with him, and had been his
companions through the most important years. More than this, they took