s
destined to be put at the head of the first mission to England in
1224.[26]

Francis, on sending them forth, was far from dreaming that from this
country, which exerted such a fascination over him, was to come forth
the influence which was to compromise his dream--that Paris would be the
destruction of Assisi; and yet the time was not very far distant; a few
years more and the Poverello would see a part of his spiritual family
forgetting the humility of their name, their origin, and their
aspirations, to run after the ephemeral laurels of learning.

We have already seen that the habit of the Franciscans of this time was
to make their abode within easy reach of great cities; Pacifico and his
companions established themselves at St. Denis.[27] We have no
particulars of their work; it was singularly fruitful, since it
permitted them a few years later to attack England with full success.

Francis passed the following year (1218) in evangelizing tours in Italy.
It is naturally impossible to follow him in these travels, the itinerary
of which was fixed by his daily inspirations, or by indications as
fanciful as the one which had formerly determined his going to Sienna.
Bologna,[28] the Verna, the valley of Rieti, the Sacro-Speco of St.
Benedict at Subiaco,[29] Gaeta;[30] San Michele on Mount Gargano[31]
perhaps received him at this time, but the notes of his presence in
these places are too sparse and vague to permit their being included in
any scheme of history.

It is very possible that he also paid a visit to Rome during this time;
his communications with Ugolini were much more frequent than is
generally supposed. We must not permit the stories of biographers to
deceive us in this matter; it is a natural tendency to refer all that we
know of a man to three or four especially striking dates. We forget
entire years of the life of those whom we have known the best and loved
the most and group our memories of them around a few salient events
which shine all the more brilliantly the deeper we make the surrounding
obscurity. The words of Jesus spoken on a hundred different occasions
came at last to be formed into a single discourse, the Sermon on the
Mount. It is in such cases that criticism needs to be delicate, to
mingle a little divination with the heavy artillery of scientific
argument.

The texts are sacred, but we must not make fetiches of them;
notwithstanding St. Matthew, no one to-day dreams of representing Jesu