ad them
feel, the love for them with which he burns: "Father, I have given them
the words which thou hast given me.... For them I pray!"

The whole Franciscan gospel is in these words, but to understand the
fascination which it exerted we must have gone through the School of the
Middle Ages, and there listened to the interminable tournaments of
dialectics by which minds were dried up; we must have seen the Church of
the thirteenth century, honeycombed by simony and luxury, and only able,
under the pressure of heresy or revolt, to make a few futile efforts to
scotch the evil.

To all Christians, monks, clerics, or laymen, whether men or
women, to all who dwell in the whole world, Brother Francis,
their most submissive servitor, presents his duty and wishes the
true peace of heaven, and sincere love in the Lord.

Being the servitor of all men, I am bound to serve them and to
dispense to them the wholesome words of my Master. This is why,
seeing I am too weak and ill to visit each one of you in
particular, I have resolved to send you my message by this
letter, and to offer you the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, the
Word of God, and of the Holy Spirit, which are spirit and life.

It would be puerile to expect here new ideas either in fact or form.
Francis's appeals are of value only by the spirit which animates them.

After having briefly recalled the chief features of the gospel, and
urgently recommended the communion, Francis addresses himself in
particular to certain categories of hearers, with special counsels.

Let the podestas, governors, and those who are placed in
authority, exercise their functions with mercy, as they would be
judged with mercy by God....

Monks in particular, who have renounced the world, are bound to
do more and better than simple Christians, to renounce all that
is not necessary to them, and to have in hatred the vices and
sins of the body.... They should love their enemies, do good to
them who hate them, observe the precepts and counsels of our
Redeemer, renounce themselves, and subdue their bodies. And no
monk is bound to obedience, if in obeying he would be obliged to
commit a fault or a sin....

Let us not be wise and learned according to the flesh, but
simple, humble, and pure.... We should never desire to be above
others, but rather to be below, and to obey all men.

He closes by sho