ty's verdict on our Saint, and his
writings. Salimbene, [Footnote 7] a contemporary chronicler, writes as
follows of Bonaventure: "He then lectured on the whole Gospel of St.
Luke--a beautiful and excellent treatise: and he wrote four books on
the Sentences which even to this day remain useful and esteemed. It
was then the year 1248 but now the year 1284." Gerson, the learned
chancellor of Paris University, is more unstinting in his praise.
"Were I to be asked," he writes, "who is the most eminent amongst all
the doctors, I should answer, without prejudice, 'Bonaventure'. I know
not that Paris ever possessed another such Doctor." And again, "In
Theology there is nothing more sublime, more divine, more salutary,
nor more sweet than Bonaventure's writings". The following striking
testimony of Pope Sixtus V in the Bull _Triumphantis
Jerusalem_--conferring on St. Bonaventure the title {15} of
"Doctor"--adumbrates his two salient characteristics as embodied in
his title "The Seraphic Doctor". "In his writings," the Pope's words
run, "Bonaventure united to the deepest erudition an equal amount of
the most ardent piety, so that whilst enlightening his readers, he
also moved their hearts, penetrating to the inmost recesses of their
souls."

[Footnote 7: "Chronica," p. 129.]

Numberless other proofs might be adduced of the high esteem in which
Bonaventure's works have always been held, but these will suffice. As
an instance, however, of the widespread popularity they enjoyed it is
curious to note that amongst the depredations of his book-borrowing
friends which Charles Lamb, the genial author of the "Essays of Elia,"
deplores, [Footnote 8] is the abstraction of his "Opera Bonaventurae".
"That foul gap in the bottom of the shelf facing you, like a great
eye-tooth knocked out, with the huge Switzer-like tomes on each side
(like the Guildhall giants in their reformed posture, guardant of
nothing) once held the tallest of my folios, 'Opera Bonaventurae,'
choice and massy divinity, to which its two supporters (school
divinity also, but of a lesser calibre--Bellarmine and Holy Thomas),
showed but as dwarfs--itself an Ascapart!"

[Footnote 8: "The Two Races of Men".]

The fundamental characteristic underlying the fervour and the love of
the Seraphic Doctor's writings, is his ever-conscious realization of
God's {16} presence. This with Bonaventure was not a feature of
passing or variable devotion; it rested upon the basis of
philo