the very centre of
Christianity; but one must be singularly spiritual to be satisfied with
the imitation of the heart. With most men there is need that this should
be preceded and sustained by an external imitation. It is indeed the
spirit that gives life, but it is only in the country of the angels that
one can say that the flesh profiteth nothing.

In the Middle Ages a religious festival was before all things else a
representation, more or less faithful, of the event which it recalled;
hence the _santons_ of Provence, the processions of the _Palmesel_, the
Holy Supper of Maundy Thursday, the Road to the Cross of Good Friday,
the drama of the Resurrection of Easter, and the flaming tow of
Whitsunday. Francis was too thoroughly Italian not to love these
festivals where every visible thing speaks of God and of his love.

The population of Greccio and its environs was, therefore, convoked, as
well as the Brothers from the neighboring monasteries. On the evening of
the vigil of Christmas one might have seen the faithful hastening to the
hermitage by every path with torches in their hands, making the forests
ring with their joyful hymns.

Everyone was rejoicing--Francis most of all. The knight had prepared a
stable with straw, and brought an ox and an ass, whose breath seemed to
give warmth to the poor _bambino_, benumbed with the cold. At the sight
the saint felt tears of pity bedew his face; he was no longer in
Greccio, his heart was in Bethlehem.

Finally they began to chant matins; then the mass was begun, and
Francis, as deacon, read the Gospel. Already hearts were touched by the
simple recital of the sacred legend in a voice so gentle and so fervent,
but when he preached, his emotion soon overcame the audience; his voice
had so unutterable a tenderness that they also forgot everything, and
were living over again the feeling of the shepherds of Judea who in
those old days went to adore the God made man, born in a stable.[27]

Toward the close of the thirteenth century, the author of the _Stabat
Mater dolorosa_, Giacopone dei Todi, that Franciscan of genius who spent
a part of his life in dungeons, inspired by the memory of Greccio,
composed another Stabat, that of joy, _Stabat Mater speciosa_. This hymn
of Mary beside the manger is not less noble than that of Mary at the
foot of the cross. The sentiment is even more tender, and it is hard to
explain its neglect except by an unjust caprice of fate.

Stabat Mate