ng out the truth.

The originality of St. Francis is only the more brilliant and
meritorious; with him gospel simplicity reappeared upon the earth.[16]
Like the lark with which he so much loved to compare himself,[17] he
was at his ease only in the open sky. He remained thus until his death.
The epistle to all Christians which he dictated in the last weeks of his
life repeats the same ideas in the same terms, perhaps with a little
more feeling and a shade of sadness. The evening breeze which breathed
upon his face and bore away his words was their symbolical
accompaniment.

"I, Brother Francis, the least of your servants, pray and conjure you by
that Love which is God himself, willing to throw myself at your feet and
kiss them, to receive with humility and love these words and all others
of our Lord Jesus Christ, to put them to profit and carry them out."

This was not a more or less oratorical formula. Hence conversions
multiplied with an incredible rapidity. Often, as formerly with Jesus, a
look, a word sufficed Francis to attach to himself men who would follow
him until their death. It is impossible, alas! to analyze the best of
this eloquence, all made of love, intimate apprehension, and fire. The
written word can no more give an idea of it than it can give us an idea
of a sonata of Beethoven or a painting by Rembrandt. We are often
amazed, on reading the memoirs of those who have been great conquerors
of souls, to find ourselves remaining cold, finding in them all no trace
of animation or originality. It is because we have only a lifeless relic
in the hand; the soul is gone. It is the white wafer of the sacrament,
but how shall that rouse in us the emotions of the beloved disciple
lying on the Lord's breast on the night of the Last Supper?

The class from which Francis recruited his disciples was still about the
same; they were nearly all young men of Assisi and its environs, some
the sons of agriculturists, and others nobles; the School and the Church
was very little represented among them.[18]

Everything still went on with an unheard-of simplicity. In theory,
obedience to the superior was absolute; in practice, we can see Francis
continually giving his companions complete liberty of action.[19] Men
entered the Order without a novitiate of any sort; it sufficed to say to
Francis that they wanted to lead with him a life of evangelical
perfection, and to prove it by giving all that they possessed to the
poor.