Life of St. Francis of Assisi Part 21

The Franciscan movement was attacked with violence[25] in various quarters; he undertook to defend it, and a very long time before the charge of protector of the Order was officially confided to him, he exercised it with devouring zeal.[26] He felt an unbounded admiration for Francis and Clara, and often manifested it in a touching manner. If he had been a simple man he might have loved them and followed them.

Perhaps he even had thought of doing so.[27] Alas! he was a prince of the Church; he could not help thinking of what he would do in case he should be called to guide the s.h.i.+p of St. Peter.

He acted accordingly; was it calculation on his part or simply one of those states of conscience in which a man absorbed in the end to be attained hardly discusses the ways and means? I do not know, but we see him immediately on the death of Innocent III., under pretext of protecting the Clarisses, take their direction in hand, give them a Rule, and subst.i.tute his own ideas for those of St. Francis.[28]

In the privilege which as legate he gave in favor of Monticelli, July 27, 1219, neither Clara nor Francis is named, and the Damianites become as a congregation of Benedictines.[29]

We shall see farther on the wrath of Francis against Brother Philip, a Zealot of the Poor Ladies, who had accepted this privilege in his absence. His att.i.tude was so firm that other doc.u.ments of the same nature granted by Ugolini at the same epoch were not indorsed by the pope until three years later.

The cardinal's ardor to profit by the enthusiasm which the Franciscan ideas everywhere excited was so great that we find, in the register of his legation of 1221, a sort of formula all prepared for those who would found convents like those of the Sisters of St. Damian; but even there we search in vain for the name of Francis or Clara.[30]

This old man had, however, a truly mystical pa.s.sion for the young abbess; he wrote to her, lamenting the necessity of being far from her, in words which are the language of love, respect, and admiration.[31]

There were at least two men in Ugolini: the Christian, who felt himself subdued before Clara and Francis; the prelate, that is, a man whom the glory of the Church sometimes caused to forget the glory of G.o.d.

Francis, though almost always resisting him, appears to have kept a feeling of ingenuous grat.i.tude toward him to the very end. Clara, on the contrary, had too long a struggle to be able to keep any illusions as to the att.i.tude of her protector. After 1230 there is no trace of any relations between them.

All the efforts of the pope to mitigate the rigor of Clara's vow of poverty had remained vain. Many other nuns desired to practise strictly the Rule of St. Francis. Among them was the daughter of the King of Bohemia, Ottokar I., who was in continual relations with Clara. But Gregory IX., to whom she addressed herself, was inflexible. While pouring eulogies upon her he enjoined upon her to follow the Rule which he sent to her--that is, the one which he had composed while he was yet cardinal. The Rule of the Poverello was put among the utopias, not to say heresies.[32] He never, however, could induce St. Clara to completely submit herself. One day, indeed, she rebelled against his orders, and it was the pope who was obliged to yield: he had desired to bring about a wider separation between the friars and the Sisters than had formerly prevailed; for a long time after the death of Francis a certain familiarity had continued between St. Damian and Portiuncula; Clara especially loved these neighborly relations, and often begged one or another Brother to come and preach. The pope thought ill of this, and forbade, under the severest penalty, that any friar of Portiuncula should go to St. Damian without express permission of the Holy See.

This time Clara became indignant. She went to the few friars attached to her monastery, and thanking them for their services, "Go," she said; "since they deprive us of those who dispense to us spiritual bread, we will not have those who procure for us our material bread." He who wrote that "_the necks of kings and princes are bowed at the feet of the priests_" was obliged to bow before this woman and raise his prohibition.[33]

St. Damian had too often echoed with St. Francis's hymns of love and liberty to forget him so soon and become an ordinary convent. Clara remained surrounded with the master's early companions; Egidio, Leo, Angelo, Ginepro never ceased to be a.s.siduous visitors. These true lovers of poverty felt themselves at home there, and took liberties which would elsewhere have given surprise. One day an English friar, a celebrated theologian, came according to the minister's orders to preach at St.

Damian. Suddenly Egidio, though a simple layman, interrupted him: "Stop, brother, let me speak," he said to him. And the master in theology, bowing his head, covered himself with his cowl as a sign of obedience, and sat down to listen to Egidio.

Clara felt a great joy in this; it seemed to her that she was once again living in St. Francis's days.[34] The little coterie was kept up until her death; she expired in the arms of Brothers Leo, Angelo, and Ginepro.

In her last sufferings and her dying visions she had the supreme happiness of being surrounded by those who had devoted their lives to the same ideal as she.[35]

In her will her life shows itself that which we have seen it--a daily struggle for the defence of the Franciscan idea. We see how courageous and brave was this woman who has always been represented as frail, emaciated, blanched like a flower of the cloister.[36]

She defended Francis not only against others, but also against himself.

In those hours of dark discouragement which so often and so profoundly disturb the n.o.blest souls and sterilize the grandest efforts, she was beside him to show him his way. When he doubted his mission and thought of fleeing to the heights of repose and solitary prayer, it was she who showed him the ripening harvest with no reapers to gather it in, men going astray with no shepherd to lead them, and drew him once again into the train of the Galilean, into the number of those who _give their lives a ransom for many_.[37]

Yet this love with which at St. Damian Francis felt himself surrounded frightened him at times. He feared that his death, making too great a void, would imperil the inst.i.tution itself, and he took pains to remind the sisters that he would not be always with them. One day when he was to preach to them, instead of entering the pulpit he caused some ashes to be brought, and after having spread them around him and scattered some on his head, he intoned the _Miserere_, thus reminding them that he was but dust and would soon return to dust.[38]

But in general it is at St. Damian that St. Francis is the most himself; it is under the shade of its olive-trees, with Clara caring for him, that he composes his finest work, that which Ernest Renan called the most perfect utterance of modern religious sentiment, the "Canticle of the Sun."

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Easy as it is to seize the large outlines of her life, it is with difficulty that one makes a detailed and doc.u.mentary study of it. There is nothing surprising in this, for the Clarisses felt the rebound of the struggles which divided and rapidly transformed the Order of the Brothers Minor. The greater number of the doc.u.ments have disappeared; we give summary indication of those which will most often be cited: 1. Life of St. Clara by an anonymous author. A. SS., _Aug._, t. ii., pp. 739-768. 2. Her Will, given by Wadding (_Annales_, 1253, No. 5), but which does not appear to be free from alteration. (Compare, for example, the opening of this will with Chapter VI. of the Rule of the Damianites approved by Innocent IV., August 8, 1253.) 3. The bull of canonization, given September 26, 1255--that is to say, two years after Clara's death; it is much longer than these doc.u.ments ordinarily are, and relates the princ.i.p.al incidents of her life. A. SS., _loc. cit._, p. 749; Potthast, 16,025. 4. Her correspondence. Unhappily we have only fragments of it; the Bollandists, without saying whence they drew them, have inserted four of her letters in the _Acta_ of St. Agnes of Bohemia, to whom they were addressed. (A. SS., _Martii_, t. i., pp.

506-508.)

[2] Reading the Chronicle of Fra Salimbeni, which represents the average Franciscan character about 1250, one sees with what reason the Rule had multiplied minute precautions for keeping the Brothers from all relations with women.

The desire of Celano to present the facts in the life of Francis as the norm of the acts of the friars appears still more in the chapters concerning St. Clara than in all the others. Vide 2 Cel., 3, 132: _Non credatis, charissimi (dixit Franciscus), quodeas perfecte non diligam.... Sed exemplum do vobis, ut quemadmodum ego facio, ita et vos faciatis._ Cf. ibid., 134.

[3] 2 Cel., 3, 55. _Fateor veritatem ... nullam me si aspicerem recogniturum in facie nisi duas_. This chapter and the two following give us a sort of caricature, in which Francis is represented as so little sure of himself that he casts down his eyes for fear of yielding to desire. The stories of Francis and Jacqueline of Settesoli give a very different picture of the relations between the Brothers and the women in the origin of the Order from that which was given later. Bernard de Besse (Turin MS., f^o. 113) relates at length the coming of Jacqueline to Portiuncula to be present at St. Francis's death. Cf.

_Spec._, 107; 133; Bon., 112. Also Clara's repast at Portiuncula. _Fior._, 15; _Spec._, 139b.; A. SS. _Aug. Vita Clar._, No. 39 ff.

[4] Isaiah, lxiii., 8 and 9 (Segond's [French] translation). At the Ma.s.s on Holy Monday Isaiah lxiii. is read for the Epistle and Mark xiv. for the Gospel.

[5] San Paolo on the Chiasco, near Bastia.

[6] At the present day diocesan seminary of a.s.sisi, "_Seminarium seraphic.u.m_." In the thirteenth century the north gate of the city was there. The houses which lie between there and the Basilica form the new town, which is rapidly growing and will unite the city with Sacro Convento.

[7] _Nam steteramus in alio loco, licet parum. Test. Clar._ It is truly strange that there is not a word here for the house where the first days of her religious life were pa.s.sed. Cf.

_Vit._, no. 10: _S. Angelus de Panse ... ubi c.u.m non plene mens ejus quiesceret._

[8] Mittarelli, _Annales Camaldulenses_ (Venice, 1755-1773, 9 vols., f^o.), t. iv., app. 431 and 435. Cf. 156.

[9] The act of donation is still in the archives of a.s.sisi. An a.n.a.lysis of it will be found in Cristofani, t. i., p. 133. Their munificence remained without result; the bull _Ab Ecclesia_ of July 27, 1232, shows that they were suppressed less than twenty years after. _Sbaralea_, t. 1, p. 81. Potthast, 8984. Cf., ib., p. 195, note c, and 340, note a, and the bulls which are there indicated.

[10] See p. 81, note ii.

[11] 1 Cel., 18; 21; 3 Soc., 24; 2 Cel., 1, 8.

[12] _An. Perus._, A. SS., p. 600. Cf. 3 Soc., 60. The three Orders are contemporary, one might even say, the four, including among them the one that miscarried among the secular priests (see below).

In a letter St. Clara speaks of her Order as making only a part with that of the Brothers: _Sequaris consilia Reverendi Patris nostri fratris Eliae Ministri generalis totius ordinis_. A. SS., Martii, t. i., p. 507.

[13] This point of view is brought into relief by an anecdote in the _De laudibus_ of Bernard of Besse (Turin MS., 113a). This is how he ends chap. vii. on the three Orders: _Nec Santus his contentus ordinibus satagebat omnium generi salutis et penitentiae viam dare. Unde parochiali cuidam sacerdoti dicenti sibi quod vellet suus, retenta tamen ecclesia. Frater esse, dato vivendi et induendi modo, dicitur indixisse ut annuatim, collectis Eclesiae fructibus daret pro Deo, quod de praeteritis superesset._

[14] See the lovely story in the _Fior._, 13. Cf. _Spec._, 65a; _Conform._, 168b. 1.

[15] The text of it was doubtless formerly inserted in chapter vi. of the Rule granted to the Clarisses of St. Damian, August 9, 1253, by the bull _Solet annuere_. Potthast, 15,086. But this chapter has been completely changed in many editions. The text of the _Speculum_, Morin, Rouen 1509, should be read. _Tract_ iii., 226b. The critical study to be made upon this text by comparing the indications given by the bull _Angelis guadium_ of May 11, 1238, Sbaralea, i., p. 242, is too long to find a place here.

[16] 2 Cel., 3, 132. Cf. _Test. B. Clar._

[17] _In illa gravi infirmitate ... faciebat se erigi ... et sedens filabat._ A. SS., 760e. _Sic vult eas [sorores] operare manibus suis._ Ib. 762a.

[18] _Fior._ 33.

[19] Rule of 1221, chap xii. _Et nulla penitus mulier ab aliquo frater recipiatur ad obedientiam, sed dato sibi consilio spirituali, ubi voluerit agat penitentiam._ Cf. below, p. 252, note 1, the remainder of this chapter and the indication of the sources. This proves, 1, that the friars had received women into the Order; 2, that at the beginning they said The Order in the singular, and under this appellation included Sisters as well as Brothers. We see how far the situation was, even at the end of 1221, from being what it became a few years later. It is to be noted that in all the reforming sects of the commencement of the thirteenth century the two s.e.xes were closely united. (Vide _Burchardi chronicon_, Pertz, 1, 23, p. 376. Cf. Potthast, 2611, bull _c.u.m otim_ of Nov. 25, 1205.)

On the 7th of June, 1201 (bull _Incunubit n.o.bis_), Innocent III.

had approved the Rule of the Humiliants. This was a religious a.s.sociation whose members continued to live in their own homes, and who offer surprising points of contact with the Franciscan Order, though they took no vow of poverty. From them issued a more restricted a.s.sociation which founded convents where they worked in wool; these convents received both men and women. Vide Jacques de Vitry, _Hist. Occidentalis_, cap. 28. _De religione et regula Humiliatorum_ (Douai, 1597, pp. 334-337). The time came when from these two Orders issued a third, composed solely of priests. These _Humiliati_ are too little known, though they have had a historian whose book is one of the n.o.ble works of the eighteenth century: Tiraboschi, _Vetera Humiliatorum monumenta_ (Milan, 3 vols., 4to, 1766-1768). Toward 1200 they had monopolized _l'arte della lana_ in all upper Italy as far as to Florence; it is evident, therefore, that Francis's father must have had relations with them.

[20] The bull approving the Rule of St. Damian is of August 9, 1253. Clara died two days later.

[21] 1 Cel., 122. Cf. Potthast, 8194 ff.; cf. ib., 709.

[22] A. SS., _Vita Cl._, p. 758. Cf. bull of canonization.

[23] _Vit. S. Clar._, A. SS., p. 758. This pet.i.tion was surely made by the medium of Francis; and there are several indications of his presence in Perugia in the latter part of the life of Innocent III. _In obitu suo [Alexandri papae] omnes familiares sui deseruerunt eum praeter fratres Minores. Et similiter Papam Gregorium et Honorium et Innocentium in cujus obitu fuit praesentialiter S. Franciscus._ Eccl. xv. _Mon. Germ. hist.

Script._, t. 28 p. 568. Sbaralea puts forth doubts as to the authenticity of this privilege, the text of which he gives; wrongly, I think, for Clara alludes to it in her will, A. SS., p. 747.

[24] He was born about 1147, created cardinal in 1198. Vide Raynald, _ann._, 1217, -- 88, the eulogy made upon him by Honorius III. _Forma decorus et venustus aspectu ... zelator fidei, disciplina virtutis, ... cast.i.tatis amator et totius sanct.i.tatis exemplar_: Muratori, _Scriptores rer. Ital._, iii., 1, 575.

[25] 1 Cel., 74.