Stoics and Saints - College of Stoic Philosophers

228 ST. FRANCIS OF ASSIST.
rulers of ages are made. His name echoes, and the influence
of his life thrills, through Europe to this day. He had a
direct and practical way of enforcing his commands. A
rebellious brother, who shewed some lingering remnant of
to the neck
the old Adam of self-will, he had buried up
in the earth, and was proceeding to bury him entirely, when
the man capitulated. Art thou dead, my brother, cried
the saint.
*
Yes, the culprit stammered. Then come forth,
and remember in future that I want dead followers, not
living ones.
The Order grew, as we may believe, mightily. There was
something in the idea of St. Francis which high-minded
women would not be the last to honour and love. Clara,
of the noble house of Ortolana, under the counsel of the
saint, forsook her home, and founded, in defiance of parental
authority, a convent of nuns who have made famous the
name and the rule of St. Clare. Sta. Clara was one of
the chief instruments in directing St. Francis to the life of
a missionary rather than the life of a recluse.
A great chapter of his Order was held at the Portiuncula,
in May
1219. Five thousand mendicants assembled. Huts
of straw and mud received them, the inhabitants of the
province delighted to supply their simple needs. They
were broken into groups of sixty or a hundred, each form
ing a little congregation, joining in prayers or listening to
discourses, the theme of which was the conquest of the
world. Thither Cardinal Ugolino came, afterwards the
vigorous Gregory IX., and casting off his purple mantle,
his hat and shoes, he was conducted in the dress of a
minor brother to the place of the great assembly. Behold/
lie cried, as he looked upon it, behold the camp
of God.
How goodly are thy tents, Jacob, and thy tabernacles,
Israel ! Francis had reason enough
to wish that his dis
ciples should have as little as might be to do with Popes