Rjmi Ce: Nthelllhe^Hqlastie T" ^Isceqmslsehper.Yictlirtls • YIITE- QU55I • Cbfls •HORITURUS
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rjMi ce: ntHElllHE^HQlASTie T" ^ISCEQMSlSEHPER.YicTlIRTlS • YIITE- QU55I • CBflS •HORITURUS. VOL. XXV. NOTRE DAME, INDIANA, JANUARY 23, 1892. No. 20. but the precursor of Petrarca and Dante- is St. Francis of Assisi. hidden from us by the veil of bigotry, and none care to go back to the dark days of mediaeval BY M. A. Q. Italy to learn something about him who rescued the language that was despised; for he was a Beloved is he, revered by all mankind, saint—the poorest of the poor—Francis of Assisi. A gentle soul, a noble heart and true, In a time when the Italian towns and cities - A child of God who in His goodness grew were proud and independent, when the nobility To love the very lambs, the birds, the wind; was impoverished by the frequency of dissension, He called them brothers, sisters; and his kind And saint-like nature ever drew and the people began to speak the borrowed Sweet words of love sincere from all who knew dialect of Provence, St. Francis was destined to How truly great was he in heart and mind. set a great example of love to his falling race. The twelfth century had waned. The quaint O sweet simplicity, divine thou art In all thy actions, be they great or small! little town of Assisi in the Umbrian Valley, Live on; still add thy incense to life's flame. which seventeen years before had witnessed the To man thou gavest true loftiness of heart, rejoicing of the simple-minded peasants at the A kindly feeling for God's creatures all. birth of a son to the wealthiest merchant of the To heav'n a saint,—immortal be his name. town, now rang with the clear voice of that son, Francis Bernardone, at the head of the Corti. ^ • » These were the golden years of his boyhood, and not a day passed without its harvest of St. Francis of Assisi. pleasure. Francis was the leader of his companions. In BY FRED E. NEEF, 92. their merry revels he was the foremost, and at their magnificent banquets he always presided. " O fear not in a world like this. And thou shalt know ere long. Yet he was temperate, and in his enjoyment he Know how sublime a thing it is never forgot the poor. The lays of the trouba To suffer and grow strong!" dours appealed to his gay temperament, and, ofttimes on the starlit summer evenings he and HEN the scholar for the his comrades went down the steep streets of first time peruses the "In Assisi singing Provencal songs. ferno" and hears in the Once it happened that a hostile band of distant realms of the poet's Perugians were seen approaching the town, and imagination the cries and the chapel-bell had summoned the men of Assisi shrieks of those who are to defend their mountain borough. Quick as cursed, he is wont to call the Italian a wonderful the light-footed stag Francis found his way to tongue; and he leaves his study a disciple of the white watch-tower at the gate of the town Dante, forgetting to reflect and inquire about to help his companions. Unfortunately, how him who made the great poet possible. ever, he was taken captive and brought to We see Shakspere foreshadowed in Chaucer; Perugia; Here he bore the seclusion of a year's 340 NOTRE DAME SCHOLASTIC imprisonment patiently and cheerfully, while delight that had once marked the son of *the his despondent prison-mates envied his light- Bernardones. The lingering illness had wrought heartedness and treated him with indifference. a great change in him. Confused, gloomy But after his liberation the memory of this event speculations tormented his mind, and he pon was soon lost with the petty joys and sorrows dered on the incidents of his early life with pain. that every day of boyhood brings. A mysterious feeling of the unrealness of exis The period of his school-life was very brief. tence left him no rest until he found relief in It seems that Francis did not like hard study. the idea of doing something greater and nobler Literature was to him, as it is to most of us, than answering the calls of boyish fancy—-he rather an accomplishment than a necessity. would become a warrior, arid fight for a good His mind was never tormented by the gram cause. Nor did the true soldier-like enthusiasm, mars of dry languages. The priests of San which had fired him on that lonely afternoon, Giorgio had taught him a little Latin; and leave him when he had returned to the enjoy although he spoke French imperfectly, still he ment of health. The Count of Brienne was showed great partiality for that language of struggling for the kingdom of his rightful heri "light and airy" songs. tage, and Francis prepared to march under his While it is true that Francis liked amusement banner. better than books, we know also with equal At the gate of the town stood the young certainty that no rash act ever stained his Assisian Cavalier clad in dazzling armor. He youthful character. His parents, delighted in had bidden farewell to his parents and to his the dazzling appearance of their son, grudged companions, and now he bade farewell to his him nothing; and we are told that often sage home. The tears that stood in his eyes bespoke looking old women reprimanded his mother, a noble joy; he saw the bright roads to glory shaking their heads and predicting a "jet-black" before him and thought only of the land of future for the young man. tropical paradises where Frederic II. dwelt At the age of twenty-five Francis fell sick. amid endless labyrinthine groves of orange The fever that haunted the fairest parts of Italy blossoms. But it seemed as if fortune were and stole like a ghost into the homes of the against the young man: a relapse of the fever rich and the poor, breathing death into the compelled him to pause at Spoleto; and when bright faces at the fireside, had stricken him. In he felt himself partially recovered he returned a little room poor Francis tossed restlessly upon home again, grieved to think of the glorious his bed till the almost unbroken succession of designs that were spoiled, low-spirited, and violent spells had utterly exhausted him. The utterly disgusted with his infirmity. days passed like long shadows before his eyes. A chain of touching episodes lead us to the At times when the fever ceased he awoke as if prime event of Francesco's history. One day from a painful dream, and when he heard the while praying in the ruined chapel of St. Damian shouts of his companions in the streets forget- he seemed to hear a voice bidding him to repair ing himself, he tried to rise; but, overpowered the crumbling walls of the church. Blinded and weakened by illness, he fell back again on with enthusiasm, he went home, and taking a his pillow like a half-wilted flower. bale of his father's finest linen, he rode to the fair At last Francis began to recover. The mild at Foligno where he sold both horse and mer sunlight shone into his dreary room, and beck chandise. Thence he hastened to St. Damian's oned him to come out into the green fields and with the proceeds. The good priest was startled breathe the pure mountain air. He heard the when Francis offered him the money, and he busy swallows twittering on the house-tops; kind refused to take it when Francis had told him friends had brought him a handful of violets how he had gotten it. Down-hearted and dis whose sweet fragrance recalled to his mind the couraged by the priest's refusal, he flung the flower-feasts of the Corti, and he longed to be purse into a window of the ruins. His father out in the open world again. was greatly exasperated when he found oiit One morning during his convalescence he what his son had done, and threw him into ventured to leave-his bed and look out from his prison. But not long afterwards, when Pietro had window, on the summer landscape. He beheld gone to France to purchase silks, Francesco's the familiar vineyards overburdened with pur kind-hearted mother released him. When Pietro ple grapes, the shady orchards of clustered returned, he went enraged to the magistrates, pomegranates, figs and olive trees, and the demanding the restoration of his money and stately oaks and firs on the mountain-side; but his boy's renunciation of all rights to inherit he loved them no longer with the same childlike ance; 'Dissatisfied with their decision, he com- NOTRE DAME SCHOLASTIC. 341 plained to the bishop. At his request,. Francis to the place which had in younger years been so brought back the money which had all the time familiar to him. The people of Assisi recognized been lying among the ruins of St. Damiah's iFrancis in all his, misery—Francis who was chapel, and threw it on the floor at his father's bpce the gay, rose-cheeked leader of their chil- feet: tears stood in his eyes as he did it; he jdren—now pale and worn, and shrouded like could not see why the father who had always a ghost in his tattered tunic. Many scoffed at been so indulgent to him in his sports and him and called him a madman; few were there festivities could have changed so suddenly who pitied the poof wayfarer; aye, some who when he wanted to give something to God.