, who alone has benignity, innocence, and purity; of
whom, by whom, and in whom is all the pardon, all the grace, all
the glory of all penitents, of all the righteous and all the
saints who are rejoicing in heaven.

"Then let nothing again hinder, let nothing again separate,
nothing again retard us, and may we all, so long as we live, in
every place, at every hour, at every time, every day and
unceasingly, truly and humbly believe. Let us have in our
hearts, let us love, adore, serve, praise, bless, glorify,
exalt, magnify, thank the most high, sovereign, eternal God,
Trinity and Unity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Creator of all
men, both of those who believe and hope in him and of those who
love him. He is without beginning and without end, immutable and
invisible, ineffable, incomprehensible, indiscernible, blessed,
lauded, glorious, exalted, sublime, most high, sweet, lovely,
delectable, and always worthy of being desired above all things,
in all the ages of ages. Amen."

Have not these artless repetitions a mysterious charm which steals
deliciously into the very depths of the heart? Is there not in them a
sort of sacrament of which the words are only the rude vehicle? Francis
is taking refuge in God, as the child throws itself upon its mother's
bosom, and in the incoherence of its weakness and its joy stammers out
all the words it knows, repeating by them all only the eternal "I am
thine" of love and faith.

There is in them also something which recalls, not only by citations,
but still more by the very inspiration of the thought, that which we
call the sacerdotal prayer of Christ. The apostle of poverty appears
here as if suspended between earth and heaven by the very strength of
his love, consecrated the priest of a new worship by the inward and
irresistible unction of the Spirit. He does not offer sacrifice like the
priest of the past time; he sacrifices himself, and carries in his body
all the woes of humanity.

The more beautiful are these words from the mystical point of view, the
less do they correspond with what is expected in a Rule; they have
neither the precision nor the brief and imperative forms of one. The
transformations which they were to undergo in order to become the code
of 1223 were therefore fatal when we consider the definitive
intervention of the Church of Rome to direct the Franciscan movement.

It is probable that this r