1. Franciscan Friars or Order of Friars Minor, called also Gray or
Begging Friars. The year in which Francis took the habit, 1208, is
reckoned the first year of the order, but the Rule was not given until
1210.
This Rule, which has not been preserved, was very simple, and
doubtless consisted of a group of gospel passages, bearing on the vow
of poverty, together with a few precepts about the occupations of the
brethren. The pope was not asked to sanction the Rule but only to give
his approbation to the missions of the little band. Some of the
cardinals expressed their doubts about the mode of life provided for in
the rules. “But,” replied Giovanni di San Paolo, “if we hold that to
observe gospel perfection and make profession of it is an irrational
and impossible innovation, are we not convicted of blasphemy against
Christ, the Author of the Gospel?”
There was also the Rule of 1221, which makes an intermediate stage
between the first Rule and that which was approved by the pope November
29, 1223. The Rule of 1210 was thoroughly Franciscan. It was the
expression of the passionate, fervent soul of Francis. It was the cry
of the human heart for God and purity. The Rule of 1223 shows that the
church had begun to direct the movement. Sabatier says of these two
rules: “At the bottom of it all is the antinome of law and love. Under
the reign of law we are the mercenaries of God, bound down to an
irksome task, but paid a hundred-fold, and with an indisputable right
to our wages.” Such was the conception underlying the Rule of 1223.
That of 1210 is thus described: “Under the rule of love we are the sons
of God, and co-workers with Him; we give ourselves to Him without
bargaining and without expectation; we follow Jesus, not because this
is well, but because we cannot do otherwise, because we feel that He
has loved us and we love Him in our turn.”
Francis would not allow his monks to be called Friars; he preferred
Friars Minor or Little Brothers as a more humble designation[F].
[Footnote F: Appendix, Note F.]
Ten years after the founding of the order, it is claimed, over five
thousand friars assembled in Rome for the general chapter. The monks
lodged in huts made of matting and hence this convention has been
called the “Chapter of Mats.” The order was strongest numerically about
fifty years after the death of Francis, when it numbered eight thousand
convents and two hundred thousand monks. Many of its members were
highly distinguished, such as St. Bonaventura, Duns Scotus, Roger Bacon
and Cardinal Ximenes.
2. Nuns of St. Clara or Poor Claras, dates from 1212, but it did not
receive its rule from Francis until 1224. The order was founded in the
following manner: Clara, a daughter of a noble family, was
distinguished for her beauty and by her love for the poor. Francis
often met her, and, in the language of his biographer, “exhorted her to
a contempt of the world and poured into her ears the sweetness of
Christ.” Guided, no doubt, by his counsel, she stole one night from her
home to a neighboring church where Francis and his beggars were
assembled. Her long and beautiful hair was cut off, while a coarse
woolen gown was substituted for her own rich garments. Standing in the
midst of the ragged monks, she renounced the dregs of Babylon and a
wicked world, pledging her future to the monastic institution. Out from
this little church into the darkness of the night, Francis led this
beautiful girl of seventeen years and committed her to a Benedictine
nunnery. Later on Clara became the abbess of a Franciscan convent at
St. Damian, and the Sisterhood of St. Clara was established. It was an
order of sadness and penitential tears. It is said that Clara never but
once (when she received the blessing of the pope) lifted her eyelids so
that the color of her eyes might be discerned.
3. The Third Order, called also “Brotherhood of Penitence,” was
composed of lay men and women. So many husbands and wives were desirous
of leaving their homes in order to enter the monastic state, that
Francis, not wishing to break up happy marriages, so it is said, was
compelled to give these enthusiasts some sort of a rule by which they
might compromise between their established life and the monastic
career. This state of things led to the formation, in 1221, of the
Third Order of St. Francis, or the Order of Tertiaries, in relation to
the Friars Minor and the Poor Claras. Sabatier says this
generally-accepted date is wrong; that it is impossible to fix any
date, for that which came to be known as the Third Order was born of
the enthusiasm excited by the preaching of Francis soon after his
return from Rome in 1210. Candidates for admission into this order were
required to make profession of all the orthodox truths, special care
being employed to guard against the intrusion of heretics. Days of
fasting and abstinence were enjoined, and members were urged to avoid
profanity, the theater, dancing and law-suits. The order met with
astonishing success, cardinals, bishops, emperors, empresses, kings and
queens, gladly enrolling themselves among the followers of St. Francis.
Dominic de Guzman, 1170-1221 A.D.
Half-way between Osma and Aranda in Old Castile, Spain, is a little
village known as “the fortunate Calahorra.” Here was the castle of the
Guzmans, where Dominic was born. His family was of high rank and
character, a noble house of warriors, statesmen and saints. If we
accept the legends, his greatness was foreshadowed. Before his birth,
his mother dreamed she saw her son under the figure of a
black-and-white dog, with a torch in his mouth. “A true dream,” says
Milman, “for he will scent out heresy and apply the torch to the
faggots;” but, as will be seen later, this observation does not rest on
undisputed evidence.
[Illustration: PHOTOGRAVURE—RINGLER CO
SAINT DOMINIC
FROM A PHOTOGRAPH OF THE PAINTING PRESERVED IN HIS CELL IN THE
CONVENT OF SANTA SABINA, AT ROME
TRENTON: ALBERT BRANDT, PUBLISHER, 1900]
In the year 1191, when Spain was desolated by a terrible famine,
Dominic was just finishing his theological studies. He gave away his
money and sold his clothes, his furniture and even his precious
manuscripts, that he might relieve distress. When his companions
expressed astonishment that he should sell his books, Dominic replied:
“Would you have me study off these dead skins, when men are dying of
hunger?” This noble utterance is cherished by his admirers as the first
saying from his lips that has passed to posterity.
Dominic was educated in the schools of Palencia, afterwards a
university, where he devoted six years to the arts and four to
theology. In 1194, when twenty-five years of age, Dominic became a
canon regular, at Osma, under the rule of St. Augustine. Nine years
after he accompanied his bishop, Don Diego, on an embassy for the king
of Castile. When they crossed the Pyrenees they found themselves in an
atmosphere of heresy. The country was filled with preachers of strange
doctrines, who had little respect for Dominic, his bishop, or their
Roman pontiff. The experiences of this journey inspired in Dominic a
desire to aid in the extermination of heresy. He was also deeply
impressed by an important and significant observation. Many of these
heretical preachers were not ignorant fanatics, but well-trained and
cultured men. Entire communities seemed to be possessed by a desire for
knowledge and for righteousness. Dominic clearly perceived that only
preachers of a high order, capable of advancing reasonable argument,
could overthrow the Albigensian heresy.
It would be impossible, in a few words, to tell the whole story of
this Albigensian movement. Undoubtedly the term stood for a variety of
theological opinions, all of which were in opposition to the teachings
of Rome. “From the very invectives of their enemies,” says Hallam, “and
the acts of the Inquisition, it is manifest that almost every shade of
heterodoxy was found among these dissidents, till it vanished in a
simple protestation against the wealth and tyranny of the clergy.” Many
of the tenets of these enthusiasts were undoubtedly borrowed from the
ancient Manicheism, and would be pronounced heretical by every modern
evangelical denomination. But associated with those holding such
doctrines were numerous reformers, whose chief offense consisted in
their incipient Protestantism. However heretical any of these sects may
have been, it is impossible to make them out enemies to the social
order, except as all opponents of established religious traditions
create disturbance. “What these bodies held in common,” says Hardwick,
“and what made them equally the prey of the inquisitor, was their
unwavering belief in the corruption of the medieval church, especially
as governed by the Roman pontiffs.”
In 1208 Dominic visited Languedoc a second time, and on his way he
encountered the papal legates returning in pomp to Rome, foiled in
their attempt to crush this growing schism. To them he administered his
famous rebuke: “It is not the display of power and pomp, cavalcades of
retainers, and richly-houseled palfreys, or by gorgeous apparel, that
the heretics win proselytes; it is by zealous preaching, by apostolic
humility, by austerity, by seeming, it is true, but by seeming
holiness. Zeal must be met by zeal, humility by humility, false
sanctity by real sanctity, preaching falsehood by preaching truth.” It
is extremely unfortunate for the reputation of Dominic that he ever
departed from the spirit of these noble words, which so clearly state
the conditions of true religious progress.
Dominic now gathered about him a few men of like spirit and began
his task of preaching down heresy. But “the enticing words of man's
wisdom” failed to win the Albigensians from what they believed to be
the words of God. So, unmindful of his admonition to the papal legates,
Dominic obtained permission of Innocent III. to hold courts, before
which he might summon all persons suspected of heresy. When eloquence
and courts failed, the pope let loose the “dogs of war.” Then followed
twenty years of frightful carnage, during which hundreds of thousands
of heretics were slain, and many cities were laid waste by fire and
sword. “This was to punish a fanaticism,” says Hallam, “ten thousand
times more innocent than their own, and errors which, according to the
worst imputations, left the laws of humanity and the peace of social
life unimpaired.” Peace was concluded in 1229, but the persecution of
heretics went on.
What part Dominic personally had in these bloody proceedings is
litigated history. His admirers strive to rescue his memory from the
charge that he was “a cruel and bloody man.” It is argued that while
the pope and temporal princes carried on the sanguinary war against the
heretics, Dominic confined himself to pleading with them in a spirit of
true Christian love. He was a minister of mercy, not an avenging angel,
sword in hand. It has to be conceded that the constant tradition of the
Dominican order that Dominic was the first Inquisitor, whether he bore
the title or not, rests upon good authority. But what was the nature of
the office as held by the saint? As far as Dominic was concerned, it is
argued by his friends that the office “was limited to the
reconciliation of heretics and had nothing to do with their
punishment.” It is also claimed that while Dominic did impose
penances, in some cases public flagellation, no evidence can be
produced showing that he ever delivered one heretic to the flames.
Those who were burned were condemned by secular courts, and on the
ground that they were not only heretics but enemies of the public peace
and perpetrators of enormous crimes.
But while it may not be proved that Dominic himself passed the
sentence of death or applied the torch to the faggots with his own
hand, he is by no means absolved from all complicity in those frightful
slaughters, or from all responsibility for the subsequent establishment
of the Holy Inquisition. The principles governing the Inquisition were
practically those upon which Dominic proceeded; the germs of the later
atrocities are to be found in his aims and methods. By what a narrow
margin does Dominic escape the charge of cruelty when it is boasted
“that he resolutely insisted on no sentence being carried out until all
means had been tried by which the conversion of a prisoner could be
effected.” Another statement also contains an inkling of a significant
fact, namely, that secular judges and princes were constantly under the
influence of the monks and other ecclesiastical persons, who incited
them to wage war, and to massacre, in the Albigensian war as in other
crusades against heresy. No word from Dominic can be produced
indicating that he remonstrated with the pope, or that he tried to stop
the crusade. In a few instances he seems to have interceded with the
crazed soldiery for the lives of women and children. But he did not
oppose the bloody crusade itself. He was constantly either with the
army or following in its wake. He often sat on the bench at the trial
of dissenters. He remained the life-long friend of Simon de Montfort,
the cruel agent of the papacy, and he blessed the marriage of his sons
and baptized his daughter. Special courts for trying heretics were
established, previous to the more complete organization of the
Inquisition, and in these he held a commission.
The Holy Office of the Inquisition was made a permanent tribunal by
Gregory IX., in 1233, twelve years after the death of Dominic, and
curiously enough, in the same year in which he was canonized. The
Catholic Bollandists claim that although the title of Inquisitor
was of later date than Dominic, yet the office was in existence,
and that the splendor of the Holy Inquisition owes its beginning to
that saint. Certain it is that the administration of the Inquisition
was mainly in the hands of Dominican monks.
In view of all these facts, Professor Allen is justified in his
conclusions respecting Dominic and his share in the persecution of
heretics: “Whatever his own sweet and heavenly spirit according to
Catholic eulogists, his name is a synonym of bleak and intolerant
fanaticism. It is fatally associated with the blackest horrors of the
crusade against the Albigenses, as well as with the infernal skill and
deadly machinery of the Inquisition.”
In 1214, Dominic established himself, with six followers, in the
house of Peter Cellani, a rich resident of Toulouse. Eleven years of
active and public life had passed since the Subprior of Osma had
forsaken the quietude of the monastery. He now resumed his life of
retirement and subjected himself and his companions to the monastic
rules of prayer and penance. But the restless spirit of the man could
not long remain content with the seclusion and inactivity of a monk's
life. The scheme of establishing an order of Preaching Friars began to
assume definite shape in his mind. He dreamed of seven stars
enlightening the world, which represented himself and his six friends.
The final result of his deliberations was the organization of his
order, and the appearance of Dominic in the city of Rome, in 1215, to
secure the approval of the pope, Innocent III. Although some describe
his reception as “most cordial and flattering,” yet it required
supernatural interference to induce the pope to grant even his approval
of the new order. It was not formally confirmed until 1216 by Honorius
III.
Dominic now made his headquarters at Rome, although he traveled
extensively in the interests of his growing brotherhood of monks. He
was made Master of the Sacred Palace, an important official post,
including among its functions the censorship of the press. It has ever
since been occupied by members of the Dominican order.
Throughout his life Dominic is said to have zealously practiced
rigorous self-denial. He wore a hair shirt, and an iron chain around
his loins, which he never laid aside, even in sleep. He abstained from
meat and observed stated fasts and periods of silence. He selected the
worst accommodations and the meanest clothes, and never allowed himself
the luxury of a bed. When traveling, he beguiled the journey with
spiritual instruction and prayers. As soon as he passed the limits of
towns and villages, he took off his shoes, and, however sharp the
stones or thorns, he trudged on his way barefooted. Rain and other
discomforts elicited from his lips nothing but praises to God.
Death came at the age of fifty-one and found him exhausted with the
austerities and labors of his eventful career. He had reached the
convent of St. Nicholas, at Bologna, weary and sick with a fever. He
refused the repose of a bed and bade the monks lay him on some sacking
stretched upon the ground. The brief time that remained to him was
spent in exhorting his followers to have charity, to guard their
humility, and to make their treasure out of poverty. Lying in ashes
upon the floor he passed away at noon, on the sixth of August, 1221. He
was canonized by Gregory IX., in 1234.