Life of St. Francis of Assisi Part 43

[27] These words are borrowed from a long fragment cited by Ubertini di Casali, as coming from Brother Leo: _Arbor vit.

cruc., lib._ v., _cap._ 3. It is surely a bit of the Legend of the Three Companions; it may be found textually in the Tribulations, Laur., f^o 16b, with a few more sentences at the end. Cf. _Conform._, 136a, 2; 143a, 2; _Spec._, 8b; 26b; 50a; 130b; 2 Cel., 3, 118.

[28] _Tribul._, Laur., 17b.

[29] See, for example, Brother Richer's question as to the books: Ubertini, _Loc. cit._ Cf. _Archiv._, iii., pp. 75 and 177; _Spec._, 8a; _Conform._, 71b, 2. See also: Ubertini, _Archiv._, iii., pp. 75 and 177; _Tribul._, 13a; _Spec._, 9a; _Conform._, 170a, 1. It is curious to compare the account as it found in the doc.u.ments with the version of it given in 2 Cel., 3, 8.

[30] a.s.sisi MS., 338, f^o 28a-31a, with the rubric: _De lictera et ammonitione beatissimi patris nostri Francisci quam misit fratribus ad capitulum quando erat infirmus._ This letter was wrongly divided into three by Rodolfo di Tossignano (f^o 237), who was followed by Wadding (Epistolae x., xi., xii.). The text is found without this senseless division in the ma.n.u.script cited and in _Firmamentum_, f^o 21; _Spec._, Morin, iii., 217a; Ubertini, _Arbor vit. cruc._, v., 7.

[31] This initial (given only by the a.s.sisi MS.) has not failed to excite surprise. It appears that there ought to have been simply an N ... This letter then would have been replaced by the copyist, who would have used the initial of the minister general in charge at the time of his writing. If this hypothesis has any weight it will aid to fix the exact date of the ma.n.u.script.

(Alberto of Pisa minister from 1239-1240; Aimon of Faversham, 1240-1244.)

[32] This epistle also was unskilfully divided into two distinct letters by Rodolfo di Tossignano, f^o 174a, who was followed by Wadding. See a.s.sisi MS., 338, 23a-28a; _Conform._, 137a, 1 ff.

[33] The letter to the clergy only repeats the thoughts already expressed upon the wors.h.i.+p of the holy sacrament. We remember Francis sweeping out the churches and imploring the priests to keep them clean; this epistle has the same object: it is found in the a.s.sisi MS., 338, f^o 31b-32b, with the rubric: _De reverentia Corporis Domini et de munditia altaris ad omnes clericos_. Incipit: _Attendamus omnes_. Explicit: _fecerint 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 generals.h.i.+p of Crescentius (Bull _Is qui ecclesiam_, March 6, 1245), the Basilica of a.s.sisi was subst.i.tuted 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 a.s.sisi 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 a.s.surance. Is he not an amba.s.sador of G.o.d? 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 wis.h.i.+ng 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 G.o.d 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 cert.i.tude 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 doc.u.ment, 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 pa.s.sages 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 G.o.d 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, pa.s.sed 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 G.o.d 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 G.o.d 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 G.o.d 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 G.o.d and they are my lords. I do this because here below I see nothing, I perceive nothing corporally of the most high Son of G.o.d, 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 G.o.d, 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_.