Chapter 6

See Baron J.A. Helfert,Kaiser Franz und die österreichischen Befreiungs-Kriege(Vienna, 1867). Ample bibliographies will be found in Krones von Marchland’sGrundriss der österreichischen Geschichte(Berlin, 1882).

FRANCIS I.(1494-1547), king of France, son of Charles of Valois, count of Angoulême, and Louise of Savoy, was born at Cognac on the 12th of September 1494. The count of Angoulême, who was the great-grandson of King Charles V., died in 1496, and Louise watched over her son with passionate tenderness. On the accession of Louis XII. in 1498, Francis became heir-presumptive. Louis invested him with the duchy of Valois, and gave him as tutor Marshal de Gié, and, after Gié’s disgrace in 1503, the sieur de Boisy, Artus Gouffier. François de Rochefort, abbot of St Mesmin, instructed Francis and his sister Marguerite in Latin and history; Louise herself taught them Italian and Spanish; and the library of the château at Amboise was well stocked with romances of the Round Table, which exalted the lad’s imagination. Francis showed an even greater love for violent exercises, such as hunting, which was his ruling passion, and tennis, and for tournaments, masquerades and amusements of all kinds. His earliest gallantries are described by his sister in the 25th and 42nd stories of theHeptameron. In 1507 Francis was betrothed to Claude, the daughter of Louis XII., and in 1508 he came to court. In 1512 he gained his first military experience in Guienne, and in the following year he commanded the army of Picardy. He married Claude on the 18th of May 1514, and succeeded Louis XII. on the 1st of January 1515. Of noble bearing, and, in spite of a very long and large nose, extremely handsome, he was a sturdy and valiant knight, affable, courteous, a brilliant talker and a facile poet. He had a sprightly wit, some delicacy of feeling, and some generous impulses which made him amiable. These brilliant qualities, however, were all on the surface. At bottom the man was frivolous, profoundly selfish, unstable, and utterly incapable of consistency or application. The ambassadors remarked his negligence, and his ministers complained of it. Hunting, tennis, jewelry and his gallantry were the chief preoccupations of his life.

His character was at once authoritative and weak. He was determined to be master and to decide everything himself, but he allowed himself to be dominated and easily persuaded. Favourites, too, without governing entirely for him, played an important part in his reign. His capricious humour elevated and deposed them with the same disconcerting suddenness. In the early years of his reign the conduct of affairs was chiefly in the hands of Louise of Savoy, Chancellor Antoine Duprat, Secretary Florimond Robertet, and the two Gouffiers, Boisy and Bonnivet. The royal favour then elevated Anne de Montmorency and Philippe de Chabot, and in the last years of the reign Marshal d’Annebaud and Cardinal de Tournon. Women too had always a great influence over Francis—his sister, Marguerite d’Angoulême, and his mistresses. Whatever the number of these, he had only two titular mistresses—at the beginning of the reign Françoise de Châteaubriant, and from about 1526 to his death Anne de Pisseleu, whom he created duchesse d’Étampes and who entirely dominated him. It has not been proved that he was the lover of Diane de Poitiers, nor does the story of “La belle Ferronnière” appear to rest on any historical foundation.1

Circumstances alone gave a homogeneous character to the foreign policy of Francis. The struggle against the emperor Charles V. filled the greater part of the reign. In reality, the policy of Francis, save for some flashes of sagacity, was irresolute and vacillating. Attracted at first by Italy, dreaming of fair feats of prowess, he led the triumphal Marignano expedition, which gained him reputation as a knightly king and as the most powerful prince in Europe. In 1519, in spite of wise counsels,he stood candidate for the imperial crown. The election of Charles V. caused an inevitable rivalry between the two monarchs which accentuated still further the light and chivalrous temper of the king and the cold and politic character of the emperor. Francis’s personal intervention in this struggle was seldom happy. He did not succeed in gaining the support of Henry VIII. of England at the interview of the Field of the Cloth of Gold in 1520; his want of tact goaded the Constable de Bourbon to extreme measures in 1522-1523; and in the Italian campaign of 1525 he proved himself a mediocre, vacillating and foolhardy leader, and by his blundering led the army to the disaster of Pavia (the 25th of February 1525), where, however, he fought with great bravery. “Of all things,” he wrote to his mother after the defeat, “nothing remains to me but honour and life, which is safe”—the authentic version of the legendary phrase “All is lost save honour.” He strove to play the part of royal captive heroically, but the prison life galled him. He fell ill at Madrid and was on the point of death. For a moment he thought of abdicating rather than of ceding Burgundy. But this was too great a demand upon his fortitude, and he finally yielded and signed the treaty of Madrid, after having drawn up a secret protest. After Madrid he wavered unceasingly between two courses, either that of continuing hostilities, or the policy favoured by Montmorency of peace and understanding with the emperor. At times he had the sagacity to recognize the utility of alliances, as was shown by those he concluded with the Porte and with the Protestant princes of Germany. But he could never pledge himself frankly in one sense or the other, and this vacillation prevented him from attaining any decisive results. At his death, however, France was in possession of Savoy and Piedmont.

In his religious policy Francis showed the same instability. Drawn between various influences, that of Marguerite d’Angoulême, the du Bellays, and the duchesse d’Étampes, who was in favour of the Reformation or at least of toleration, and the contrary influence of the uncompromising Catholics, Duprat, and then Montmorency and de Tournon, he gave pledges successively to both parties. In the first years of the reign, following the counsels of Marguerite, he protected Jacques Lefèvre of Etaples and Louis de Berquin, and showed some favour to the new doctrines. But the violence of the Reformers threw him into the arms of the opposite party. The affair of the Placards in 1534 irritated him beyond measure, and determined him to adopt a policy of severity. From that time, in spite of occasional indulgences shown to the Reformers, due to his desire to conciliate the Protestant powers, Francis gave a free hand to the party of repression, of which the most active and most pitiless member was Cardinal de Tournon; and the end of the reign was sullied by the massacre of the Waldenses (1545).

Francis introduced new methods into government. In his reign the monarchical authority became more imperious and more absolute. His was the government “du bon plaisir.” By the unusual development he gave to the court he converted the nobility into a brilliant household of dependants. The Concordat brought the clergy into subjection, and enabled him to distribute benefices at his pleasure among the most docile of his courtiers. He governed in the midst of a group of favourites, who formed theconseil des affaires. The states-general did not meet, and the remonstrances of the parlement were scarcely tolerated. By centralizing the financial administration by the creation of theTrésor de l’Épargne, and by developing the military establishments, Francis still further strengthened the royal power. His government had the vices of his foreign policy. It was uncertain, irregular and disorderly. The finances were squandered in gratifying the king’s unbridled prodigality, and the treasury was drained by his luxurious habits, by the innumerable gifts and pensions he distributed among his mistresses and courtiers, by his war expenses and by his magnificent buildings. His government, too, weighed heavily upon the people, and the king was less popular than is sometimes imagined.

Francis owes the greater measure of his glory to the artists and men of letters who vied in celebrating his praises. He was pre-eminently the king of the Renaissance. Of a quick and cultivated intelligence, he had a sincere love of letters and art. He holds a high place in the history of humanism by the foundation of the Collège de France; he did not found an actual college, but after much hesitation instituted in 1530, at the instance of Guillaume Budé (Budaeus),Lecteurs royaux, who in spite of the opposition of the Sorbonne were granted full liberty to teach Hebrew, Greek, Latin, mathematics, &c. The humanists Budé, Jacques Colin and Pierre Duchâtel were the king’s intimates, and Clément Marot was his favourite poet. Francis sent to Italy for artists and for works of art, but he protected his own countrymen also. Here, too, he showed his customary indecision, wavering between the two schools. At his court he installed Benvenuto Cellini, Francesco Primaticcio and Rosso del Rosso, but in the buildings at Chambord, St Germain, Villers-Cotterets and Fontainebleau the French tradition triumphed over the Italian.

Francis died on the 31st of March 1547, of a disease of the urinary ducts according to some accounts, of syphilis according to others. By his first wife Claude (d. 1524) he had three sons and four daughters: Louise, who died in infancy; Charlotte, who died at the age of eight; Francis (d. 1536); Henry, who came to the throne as Henry II.; Madeleine, who became queen of Scotland; Charles (d. 1545); and Margaret, duchess of Savoy. In 1530 he married Eleanor, the sister of the emperor Charles V.

Authorities.—For the official acts of the reign, theCatalogue des actes de François Ier, published by the Académie des Sciences morales et politiques (Paris, 1887-1907), is a valuable guide. TheBibliothèque Nationale, theNational Archives, &c., contain a mass of unpublished documents. Of the published documents, see N. Camuzat,Meslanges historiques... (Troyes, 1619); G. Ribier,Lettres et mémoires d’estat(Paris, 1666);Letters de Marguerite d’Angoulême, ed. by F. Genin (Paris, 1841 and 1842); theCorrespondence of Castillon and Marillac(ed. by Kaulek, Paris, 1885), ofOdet de Selve(ed. by Lefèvre-Pontalis, Paris, 1888), and ofGuillaume Pellicier(ed. by Tausserat-Radel, Paris, 1900);Captivité du roi François Ier, andPoésies de François Ier(both ed. by Champollion-Figeac, Paris, 1847, of doubtful authenticity);Relations des ambassadeurs vénitiens, &c. Of the memoirs and chronicles, see the journal of Louise of Savoy in S. Guichenon’sHistoire de la maison de Savoie, vol. iv. (ed. of 1778-1780);Journal de Jean Barillon, ed. by de Vaissière (Paris, 1897-1899);Journal d’un bourgeois de Paris, ed. by Lalanne (Paris, 1854);Cronique du roy François Ier, ed. by Guiffrey (Paris, 1868); and the memoirs of Fleuranges, Montluc, Tavannes, Vieilleville, Brantôme and especially Martin du Bellay (coll. Michaud and Poujoulat). Of the innumerable secondary authorities, see especially Paulin Paris,Études sur le règne de François Ier(Paris, 1885), in which the apologetic tendency is excessive; and H. Lemonnier in vol. v. (Paris, 1903-1904) of E. Lavisse’sHistoire de France, which gives a list of the principal secondary authorities. There is a more complete bibliographical study by V.L. Bourrilly in theRevue d’histoire moderne et contemporaine, vol. iv. (1902-1903). The printed sources have been catalogued by H. Hauser,Les Sources de l’histoire de France, XVIesiècle, tome ii. (Paris, 1907).

(J. I.)

1On this point see Paulin Paris,Études sur le règne de François Ier.

FRANCIS II.(1544-1560), king of France, eldest son of Henry II. and of Catherine de’ Medici, was born at Fontainebleau on the 19th of January 1544. He married the famous Mary Stuart, daughter of James V. of Scotland, on the 25th of April 1558, and ascended the French throne on the 10th of July 1559. During his short reign the young king, a sickly youth and of feeble understanding, was the mere tool of his uncles Francis, duke of Guise, and Charles, cardinal of Lorraine, into whose hands he virtually delivered the reins of government. The exclusiveness with which they were favoured, and their high-handed proceedings, awakened the resentment of the princes of the blood, Anthony king of Navarre and Louis prince of Condé, who gave their countenance to a conspiracy (conspiracy of Amboise) with the Protestants against the house of Guise. It was, however, discovered shortly before the time fixed for its execution in March 1560, and an ambush having been prepared, most of the conspirators were either killed or taken prisoners. Its leadership and organization had been entrusted to Godfrey de Barri, lord of la Renaudie (d. 1560); and the prince of Condé, who was not present, disavowed all connexion with the plot. The duke of Guise was now named lieutenant-general of the kingdom, but his Catholic leanings were somewhat held in check by thechancellor Michel de l’Hôpital, through whose mediation the edict of Romorantin, providing that all cases of heresy should be decided by the bishops, was passed in May 1560, in opposition to a proposal to introduce the Inquisition. At a meeting of the states-general held at Orleans in the December following, the prince of Condé, after being arrested, was condemned to death, and extreme measures were being enacted against the Huguenots; but the deliberations of the Assembly were broken off, and the prince was saved from execution, by the king’s somewhat sudden death, on the 5th of the month, from an abscess in the ear.

Principal Authorities.—“Lettres de Catherine de Médicis,” edited by Hector de la Ferrière (1880 seq.), and “Négociations ... relatives au règne de François II,” edited by Louis Paris (1841), both in theCollection de documents inédits sur l’histoire de France; notice of Francis, duke of Guise, in theNouvelle Collection des mémoires pour servir à l’histoire de France, edited by J.F. Michaud and J.J.F. Poujoulat, series i. vol. vi. (1836 seq.);Mémoires de Condé servant d’éclaircissement ... à l’histoire de M. de Thou, vols. i and ii. (1743); Pierre de la Place,Commentaires de l’estat de la religion et de la république sous les rois Henri II, François II, Charles IX(1565); and Louis Régnier de la Planche,Histoire de l’estat de France ... sous ... François II(Panthéon littéraire, new edition, 1884). See also Ernest Lavisse,Histoire de France(vol. vi. by J.H. Mariéjol, 1904), which contains a bibliography.

FRANCIS I.(1777-1830), king of the Two Sicilies, was the son of Ferdinand IV. (I.) and Maria Carolina of Austria. He married Clementina, daughter of the emperor Leopold II. of Austria, in 1796, and at her death Isabella, daughter of Charles IV. of Spain. After the Bourbon family fled from Naples to Sicily in 1806, and Lord William Bentinck, the British resident, had established a constitution and deprived Ferdinand IV. of all power, Francis was appointed regent (1812). On the fall of Napoleon his father returned to Naples and suppressed the Sicilian constitution and autonomy, incorporating his two kingdoms into that of the Two Sicilies (1816); Francis then assumed the revived title of duke of Calabria. While still heir-apparent he professed liberal ideas, and on the outbreak of the revolution of 1820 he accepted the regency apparently in a friendly spirit towards the new constitution. But he was playing a double game and proved to be the accomplice of his father’s treachery. On succeeding to the throne in 1825 he cast aside the mask of liberalism and showed himself as reactionary as his father. He took little part in the government, which he left in the hands of favourites and police officials, and lived with his mistresses, surrounded by soldiers, ever in dread of assassination. During his reign the only revolutionary movement was the outbreak on the Cilento (1828), savagely repressed by the marquis Delcarretto, an ex-Liberal turned reactionary.

See Nisco,Il Reame di Napoli sotto Francesco I(Naples, 1893).

FRANCIS II.(1836-1894), king of the Two Sicilies, son of Ferdinand II. and Maria Cristina of Savoy, was the last of the Bourbon kings of Naples. His education had been much neglected and he proved a man of weak character, greatly influenced by his stepmother Maria Theresa of Austria, by the priests, and by theCamarilla, or reactionary court set. He ascended the throne on the death of his father (22nd of May 1859). As prime minister he at once appointed Carlo Filangieri, who, realizing the importance of the Franco-Piedmontese victories in Lombardy, advised Francis to accept the alliance with Piedmont proposed by Cavour. On the 7th of June a part of the Swiss Guard mutinied, and while the king mollified them by promising to redress their grievances, General Nunziante collected other troops, who surrounded the mutineers and shot them down. The incident resulted in the disbanding of the whole Swiss Guard, the strongest bulwark of the dynasty. Cavour again proposed an alliance to divide the papal states between Piedmont and Naples, the province of Rome excepted, but Francis rejected an idea which to him savoured of sacrilege. Filangieri strongly advocated a constitution as the only measure which might save the dynasty, and on the king’s refusal he resigned. Meanwhile the revolutionary parties were conspiring for the overthrow of the Bourbons in Calabria and Sicily, and Garibaldi was preparing for a raid in the south. A conspiracy in Sicily was discovered and the plotters punished with brutal severity, but Rosalino Pilo and Francesco Crispi had organized the movement, and when Garibaldi landed at Marsala (May 1860) he conquered the island with astonishing ease. These events at last frightened Francis into granting a constitution, but its promulgation was followed by disorders in Naples and the resignation of ministers, and Liborio Romano became head of the government. The disintegration of the army and navy proceeded apace, and Cavour sent a Piedmontese squadron carrying troops on board to watch events. Garibaldi, who had crossed the straits of Messina, was advancing northwards and was everywhere received by the people as a liberator. Francis, after long hesitations and even an appeal to Garibaldi himself, left Naples (6th of September) with his wife Maria Sophia, the court, the diplomatic corps (the French and English ministers excepted), and went by sea to Gaeta, where a large part of the army was concentrated. The next day Garibaldi entered Naples, was enthusiastically welcomed, and formed a provisional government. King Victor Emmanuel had decided on the invasion of the papal states, and after occupying Romagna and the Marche entered the Neapolitan kingdom. Garibaldi’s troops defeated the Neapolitan royalists on the Volturno (1st and 2nd of October), while the Piedmontese captured Capua. Only Gaeta, Messina, and Civitella del Tronto still held out, and the siege of the former by the Piedmontese began on the 6th of November 1860. Both Francis and Maria Sophia behaved with great coolness and courage, and even when the French fleet, whose presence had hitherto prevented an attack by sea, was withdrawn, they still resisted; it was not until the 12th of February 1861 that the fortress capitulated. Thus the kingdom of Naples was incorporated in that of Italy, and the royal pair from that time forth led a wandering life in Austria, France and Bavaria. Francis died on the 27th of December 1894 at Arco in Tirol. His widow survived him.

Francis II. was weak-minded, stupid and vacillating, but, although his short reign was stained with some cruel massacres and persecutions, he was less of a tyrant than his father. The courage and dignity he displayed during his reverses inspired pity and respect. But the fact that he protected brigandage in his former dominions and countenanced the most abominable crimes in the name of legitimism greatly diminished the sympathy which was felt for the fallen monarch.

Bibliography.—R. de Cesare,La Fine d’un regno, vol. ii. (Città di Castello, 1900) gives a detailed account of the reign of Francis II., while H.R. Whitehouse’sCollapse of the Kingdom of Naples(New York, 1899) may be recommended to English readers; Nisco’sFrancesco II(Naples, 1887) should also be consulted. See underNaples;Garibaldi;Bixio;Cavour;Italy;Filangieri; &c.

(L. V.*)

FRANCIS IV.(1779-1846) duke of Modena, was the son of the archduke Ferdinand, Austrian governor of Lombardy, who acquired the duchy of Modena through his wife Marie Beatrice, heiress of the house of Este as well as of many fiefs of the Malaspina, Pio da Carpi, Pico della Mirandola, Cibò, and other families. At the time of the French invasion (1796) Francis was sent to Vienna to be educated, and in 1809 was appointed governor of Galicia. Later he went to Sardinia, where the exiled King Victor Emmanuel I. and his wife Maria Theresa were living in retirement. The latter arranged a marriage between her daughter Marie Beatrice and Francis, and a secret family compact was made whereby if the king and his two brothers died without male issue, the Salic law would be changed so that Francis should succeed to the kingdom instead of Charles Albert of Carignano (N. Bianchi,Storia della diplomazia europea in Italia, i. 42-43). On the fall of Napoleon in 1814 Francis received the duchy of Modena, including Massa-Carrara and Lunigiana; his mother’s advice was “to be above the law ... never to forgive the Republicans of 1796, nor to listen to the complaints of his subjects, whom nothing satisfies; the poorer they are the quieter they are” (Silingardi, “Ciro Menotti,” inRivista europea, Florence, 1880).

The duke was well received at Modena; inordinately ambitious, strong-willed, immensely rich, avaricious but not unintelligent, he soon proved one of the most reactionary despots in Italy.He still hoped to acquire either Piedmont or some other part of northern Italy, and he was in touch with the Sanfedisti and the Concistoro, reactionary Catholic associations opposed to the Carbonari, but not always friendly to Austria. Against the Carbonari and other Liberals he issued the severest edicts, and although there was no revolt at Modena in 1821 as in Piedmont and Naples, he immediately instituted judicial proceedings against the supposed conspirators. Some 350 persons were arrested and tortured, 56 being condemned to death (only a few of them were executed) and 237 to imprisonment; a large number, however, escaped, including Antonio Panizzi (afterwards director of the British Museum). The ferocious police official Besini who conducted the trials was afterwards murdered. The duke actually proposed to Prince Metternich, the Austrian chancellor, an agreement whereby the various Italian rulers were to arrest every Liberal in the country on a certain day, but the project fell through owing to opposition from the courts of Florence and Rome. At the congress of Verona Metternich made another attempt to secure the Piedmontese succession for Francis, but without success. The duke became ever more despotic; Modena swarmed with spies and informers, education was hampered, feudalism strengthened; for the duke hoped to consolidate his power by means of the nobility, and the least expression of liberalism, or even failure to denounce a Carbonaro, involved arrest and imprisonment. But strange to say, in 1830 we find Francis actually coquetting with revolution. Having lost all hope of acquiring the Piedmontese throne, he entered into negotiations with the French Orleanist party with a view to obtaining its support in his plans for extending his dominions. He was thus brought into touch with Ciro Menotti (1798-1831) and the Modenese Liberals; what the nature of the connexion was is still obscure, but it was certainly short-lived and merely served to betray the Carbonari. As soon as Francis learned that a conspiracy was on foot to gain possession of the town, he had Menotti and several other conspirators arrested on the night of the 3rd of February 1831, and sent the famous message to the governor of Reggio: “The conspirators are in my hands; send me the hangman” (there is some doubt as to the authenticity of the actual words). But the revolt broke out in other parts of the duchy and in Romagna, and Francis retired to Mantua with Menotti. A provisional government was formed at Modena which proclaimed that “Italy is one,” but the duke returned a few weeks later with Austrian troops, and resistance was easily quelled. Then the political trials began; Menotti and two others were executed, and hundreds condemned to imprisonment. The population was now officially divided into four classes, viz. “very loyal, loyal, less loyal, and disloyal,” and the reaction became worse than ever, the duke interfering in the minutest details of administration, such as hospitals, schools, and roads. New methods of procedure were introduced to deal with political trials, but the ministerial cabal by which the country was administered intrigued and squabbled to such an extent that it had to be dismissed.

On the 20th of February 1846 Francis died. Although he had many domestic virtues and charming manners, was charitable in times of famine, and was certainly the ablest of the Italian despots, Liberalism was in his eyes the most heinous of crimes, and his reign is one long record of barbarous persecution.

(L. V.*)

FRANCIS V.(1819-1875), duke of Modena, son of Francis IV., succeeded his father in 1846. Although less cruel and also less intelligent than his father, he had an equally high opinion of his own authority. His reign began with disturbances at Fivizzano and Pontremoli, which Tuscany surrendered to him according to treaty but against the wishes of the inhabitants (1847), and at Massa and Carrara, where the troops shot down the people. Feeling his position insecure, the duke asked for and obtained an Austrian garrison, but on the outbreak of revolution throughout Italy and at Vienna in 1848, further disorders occurred in the duchy, and on the 20th of March he fled with his family to Mantua. A provisional government was formed, and volunteers were raised who fought with the Piedmontese against Austria. But after the Piedmontese defeat Francis returned to Modena, with Austrian assistance, in August and conferred many appointments on Austrian officers. Like his father, he interfered in the minutest details of administration, and instituted proceedings against all who were suspected of Liberalism. Not content with the severity of his judges, he overrode their sentences in favour of harsher punishments. The disturbances at Carrara were ruthlessly suppressed, and the prisons filled with politicals. In 1859 numbers of young Modenese fled across the frontier to join the Piedmontese army, as war with Austria seemed imminent; and after the Austrian defeat at Magenta the duke left Modena to lead his army in person against the Piedmontese, taking with him the contents of the state treasury and many valuable books, pictures, coins, tapestries and furniture from the palace. The events of 1859-1860 made his return impossible; and after a short spell of provisional government the duchy was united to Italy. He retired to Austria, and died at Munich in November 1875.

Bibliography.—N. Bianchi,I Ducati Estensi(Turin, 1852); Galvani,Memorie di S.A.R. Francesco IV(Modena, 1847);Documenti riguardanti il governo degli Austro-Estensi in Modena(Modena, 1860); C. Tivaroni,L’Italia durante il dominio austriaco, i. 606-653 (Turin, 1892), andL’Italia degli Italiani, i. 114-125 (Turin, 1895); Silingardi, “Ciro Menotti,” in theRivista europea(Florence, 1880); F.A. Gualterio,Gli ultimi rivolgimenti italiani(Florence, 1850); Bayard de Volo,Vita di Francesco V(4 vols., Modena, 1878-1885).

(L. V.*)

FRANCIS OF ASSISI, ST.(1181 or 1182-1226), founder of the Franciscans (q.v.), was born in 1181 or 1182 at Assisi, one of the independent municipal towns of Umbria. He came from the upper middle class, his father, named Pietro Bernardone, being one of the larger merchants of the city. Bernardone’s commercial enterprises made him travel abroad, and it was from the fact that the father was in France at the time of his son’s birth that the latter was called Francesco. His education appears to have been of the slightest, even for those days. It is difficult to decide whether words of the early biographers imply that his youth was not free from irregularities; in any case, he was the recognized leader of the young men of the town in their revels; he was, however, always conspicuous for his charity to the poor. When he was twenty (1201) the neighbouring and rival city of Perugia attempted to restore by force of arms the nobles who had been expelled from Assisi by the burghers and the populace, and Francis took part in the battle fought in the plain that lies between the two cities; the men of Assisi were defeated and Francis was among the prisoners. He spent a year in prison at Perugia, and when peace was made at the end of 1202 he returned to Assisi and recommenced his old life.

Soon a serious and prolonged illness fell upon him, during which he entered into himself and became dissatisfied with his way of life. On his recovery he set out on a military expedition, but at the end of the first day’s march he fell ill, and had to stay at Spoleto and return to Assisi. This disappointment brought on again the spiritual crisis he had experienced in his illness, and for a considerable time the conflict went on within him. One day he gave a banquet to his friends, and after it they sallied forth with torches, singing through the streets, Francis being crowned with garlands as the king of the revellers; after a time they missed him, and on retracing their steps they found him in a trance or reverie, a permanently altered man. He devoted himself to solitude, prayer and the service of the poor, and before long went on a pilgrimage to Rome. Finding the usual crowd of beggars before St Peter’s, he exchanged his clothes with one of them, and experienced an overpowering joy in spending the day begging among the rest. The determining episode of his life followed soon after his return to Assisi; as he was riding he met a leper who begged an alms; Francis had always had a special horror of lepers, and turning his face he rode on; but immediately an heroic act of self-conquest was wrought in him; returning he alighted, gave the leper all the money he had about him, and kissed his hand. From that day he gave himself up to the service of the lepers and the hospitals. To the confusion of his father and brothers he went about dressed in rags, so that his old companions pelted him with mud.Things soon came to a climax with his father: in consequence of his profuse alms to the poor and to the restoration of the ruined church of St Damian, his father feared his property would be dissipated, so he took Francis before the bishop of Assisi to have him legally disinherited; but without waiting for the documents to be drawn up, Francis cast off his clothes and gave them back to his father, declaring that now he had better reason to say “Our Father which art in heaven,” and having received a cloak from the bishop, he went off into the woods of Mount Subasio singing a French song; some brigands accosted him and he told them he was the herald of the great king (1206).

The next three years he spent in the neighbourhood of Assisi in abject poverty and want, ministering to the lepers and the outcasts of society. It was now that he began to frequent the ruined little chapel of St Mary of the Angels, known as the Portiuncula, where much of his time was passed in prayer. One day while Mass was being said therein, the words of the Gospel came to Francis as a call: “Everywhere on your road preach and say—The kingdom of God is at hand. Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, drive out devils. Freely have you received, freely give. Carry neither gold nor silver nor money in your girdles, nor bag, nor two coats, nor sandals, nor staff, for the workman is worthy of his hire” (Matt. x. 7-10). He at once felt that this was his vocation, and the next day, layman as he was, he went up to Assisi and began to preach to the poor (1209). Disciples joined him, and when they were twelve in number Francis said: “Let us go to our Mother, the holy Roman Church, and tell the pope what the Lord has begun to do through us, and carry it out with his sanction.” They obtained the sanction of Innocent III., and returning to Assisi they gave themselves up to their life of apostolic preaching and work among the poor.

The character and development of the order are traced in the articleFranciscans; here the story of Francis’s own life and the portrayal of his personality will be attempted. To delineate in a few words the character of the Poverello of Assisi is indeed a difficult task. There is such a many-sided richness, such a tenderness, such a poetry, such an originality, such a distinction revealed by the innumerable anecdotes in the memoirs of his disciples, that his personality is brought home to us as one of the most lovable and one of the strongest of men. It is probably true to say that no one has ever set himself so seriously to imitate the life of Christ and to carry out so literally Christ’s work in Christ’s own way. This was the secret of his love of poverty as manifested in the following beautiful prayer which he addressed to our Lord: “Poverty was in the crib and like a faithful squire she kept herself armed in the great combat Thou didst wage for our redemption. During Thy passion she alone did not forsake Thee. Mary Thy Mother stopped at the foot of the Cross, but poverty mounted it with Thee and clasped Thee in her embrace unto the end; and when Thou wast dying of thirst, as a watchful spouse she prepared for Thee the gall. Thou didst expire in the ardour of her embraces, nor did she leave Thee when dead, O Lord Jesus, for she allowed not Thy body to rest elsewhere than in a borrowed grave. O poorest Jesus, the grace I beg of Thee is to bestow on me the treasure of the highest poverty. Grant that the distinctive mark of our Order may be never to possess anything as its own under the sun for the glory of Thy name, and to have no other patrimony than begging” (in theLegenda 3 Soc.). This enthusiastic love of poverty is certainly the keynote of St Francis’s spirit; and so one of his disciples in an allegorical poem (translated into English asThe Lady of Povertyby Montgomery Carmichael, 1901), and Giotto in one of the frescoes at Assisi, celebrated the “holy nuptials of Francis with Lady Poverty.”

Another striking feature of Francis’s character was his constant joyousness; it was a precept in his rule, and one that he enforced strictly, that his friars should be always rejoicing in the Lord. He retained through life his early love of song, and during his last illness he passed much of his time in singing. His love of nature, animate and inanimate, was very keen and manifested itself in ways that appear somewhat naïve. His preaching to the birds is a favourite representation of St Francis in art. All creatures he called his “brothers” or “sisters”—the chief example is the poem of the “Praises of the Creatures,” wherein “brother Sun,” “sister Moon,” “brother Wind,” and “sister Water” are called on to praise God. In his last illness he was cauterized, and on seeing the burning iron he addressed “brother Fire,” reminding him how he had always loved him and asking him to deal kindly with him. It would be an anachronism to think of Francis as a philanthropist or a “social worker” or a revivalist preacher, though he fulfilled the best functions of all these. Before everything he was an ascetic and a mystic—an ascetic who, though gentle to others, wore out his body by self-denial, so much so that when he came to die he begged pardon of “brother Ass the body” for having unduly ill treated it: a mystic irradiated with the love of God, endowed in an extraordinary degree with the spirit of prayer, and pouring forth his heart by the hour in the tenderest affections to God and our Lord. St Francis was a deacon but not a priest.

From the return of Francis and his eleven companions from Rome to Assisi in 1209 or 1210, their work prospered in a wonderful manner. The effect of their preaching, and their example and their work among the poor, made itself felt throughout Umbria and brought about a great religious revival. Great numbers came to join the new order which responded so admirably to the needs of the time. In 1212 Francis invested St Clara (q.v.) with the Franciscan habit, and so instituted the “Second Order,” that of the nuns. As the friars became more and more numerous their missionary labours extended wider and wider, spreading first over Italy, and then to other countries. Francis himself set out, probably in 1212, for the Holy Land to preach the Gospel to the Saracens, but he was shipwrecked and had to return. A year or two later he went into Spain to preach to the Moors, but had again to return without accomplishing his object (1215 probably). After another period of preaching in Italy and watching over the development of the order, Francis once again set out for the East (1219). This time he was successful; he made his way to Egypt, where the crusaders were besieging Damietta, got himself taken prisoner and was led before the sultan, to whom he openly preached the Gospel. The sultan sent him back to the Christian camp, and he passed on to the Holy Land. Here he remained until September 1220. During his absence were manifested the beginnings of the troubles in the order that were to attain to such magnitude after his death. The circumstances under which, at an extraordinary general chapter convoked by him shortly after his return, he resigned the office of minister-general (September 1220) are explained in the articleFranciscans: here, as illustrating the spirit of the man, it is in place to cite the words in which his abdication was couched: “Lord, I give Thee back this family which Thou didst entrust to me. Thou knowest, most sweet Jesus, that I have no more the power and the qualities to continue to take care of it. I entrust it, therefore, to the ministers. Let them be responsible before Thee at the Day of Judgment, if any brother by their negligence, or their bad example, or by a too severe punishment, shall go astray.” These words seem to contain the mere truth: Francis’s peculiar religious genius was probably not adapted for the government of an enormous society spread over the world, as the Friars Minor had now become.

The chief works of the next years were the revision and final redaction of the Rule and the formation or organization of the “Third Order” or “Brothers and Sisters of Penance,” a vast confraternity of lay men and women who tried to carry out, without withdrawing from the world, the fundamental principles of Franciscan life (seeTertiaries).

If for no other reason than the prominent place they hold in art, it would not be right to pass by the Stigmata without a special mention. The story is well known; two years before his death Francis went up Mount Alverno in the Apennines with some of his disciples, and after forty days of fasting and prayer and contemplation, on the morning of the 14th of September 1224 (to use Sabatier’s words), “he had a vision: in the warm rays of the rising sun he discerned suddenly a strangefigure. A seraph with wings extended flew towards him from the horizon and inundated him with pleasure unutterable. At the centre of the vision appeared a cross, and the seraph was nailed to it. When the vision disappeared Francis felt sharp pains mingling with the delights of the first moment. Disturbed to the centre of his being he anxiously sought the meaning of it all, and then he saw on his body the Stigmata of the Crucified.” The early authorities represent the Stigmata not as bleeding wounds, the holes as it were of the nails, but as fleshy excrescences resembling in form and colour the nails, the head on the palm of the hand, and on the back as it were a nail hammered down. In the first edition of theVie, Sabatier rejected the Stigmata; but he changed his mind, and in the later editions he accepts their objective reality as an historically established fact; in an appendix he collects the evidence: there exists what is according to all probability an autograph of Br. Leo, the saint’s favourite disciple and companion on Mount Alverno at the time, which describes the circumstances of the stigmatization; Elias of Cortona (q.v.), the acting superior, wrote on the day after his death a circular letter wherein he uses language clearly implying that he had himself seen the Stigmata, and there is a considerable amount of contemporary authentic second hand evidence. On the strength of this body of evidence Sabatier rejects all theories of fraud or hallucination, whatever may be the explanation of the phenomena.

Francis was so exhausted by the sojourn on Mount Alverno that he had to be carried back to Assisi. The remaining months of his life were passed in great bodily weakness and suffering, and he became almost blind. However, he worked on with his wonted cheerfulness and joyousness. At last, on the 3rd of October 1226, he died in the Portiuncula at the age of forty-five. Two years later he was canonized by Gregory IX., whom, as Cardinal Hugolino of Ostia, he had chosen to be the protector of his order.

The works of St Francis consist of the Rule (in two redactions), the Testament, spiritual admonitions, canticles and a few letters. They were first edited by Wadding in 1623. Two critical editions were published in 1904, one by the Franciscans of Quaracchi near Florence, the other (in a longer and a shorter form) by Professor H. Boehmer of Bonn. Sabatier and Goetz (see below) have investigated the authenticity of the several works; and the four lists, while exhibiting slight variations, are in substantial accord. Besides the works, properly so called, there is a considerable amount of traditional matter—anecdotes, sayings, sermons—preserved in the biographies and in theFioretti;1a great deal of this matter is no doubt substantially authentic, but it is not possible to subject it to any critical sifting.

Note on Sources.—The sources for the life of St Francis and early Franciscan history are very numerous, and an immense literature has grown up around them. Any attempt to indicate even a selection of this literature would here be impossible and also futile; for the discovery of new documents has by no means ceased, and the criticism of the materials is still in full progress, nor can it be said that final results have yet emerged from the discussion. Students will find the chief materials in the following collections:Archiv für Litteratur und Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters(ed. by Ehrle and Denifle, 1885, &c.); publications of the Franciscans of Quaracchi (list to be obtained from Herder, Freiburg im Breisgau); and the two series edited by Paul Sabatier,Collection d’études et de documents sur l’histoire religieuse et littéraire du moyen âge(5 vols. published up to 1906) andOpuscules de critique historique(12 fascicules): the easiest and most consecutive way of following the controversy is by the aid of the “Bulletin Hagiographique” inAnalecta Bollandiana. Relatively popular accounts of the most important sources are supplied in the introductory chapters of Sabatier’sVie de S. FrançoisandSpeculum perfectionis, and Lempp’sFrère Élie de Cortone.Concerning the life of St Francis and the beginnings of the order, the chief documents that come under discussion are: the twoLivesby Thomas of Celano (1228 and 1248 respectively; Eng. trans. with introduction by A.G. Ferrers Howell, 1908), of which the only critical edition is that of Friar Ed. d’Alençon (1906); the so-calledLegenda trium sociorum; theSpeculum perfectionis, discovered by Paul Sabatier and edited in 1898 (Eng. trans. by Sebastian Evans,Mirror of Perfection, 1899). Sabatier’s theory as to the nature of these documents was, in brief, that theSpeculum perfectioniswas the first of all the Lives of the saint, written in 1227 by Br. Leo, his favourite and most intimate disciple, and that theLegenda 3 Soc.is what it claims to be—the handiwork of Leo and the two other most intimate companions of Francis, compiled in 1246; these are the most authentic and the only true accounts, Thomas of Celano’s Lives being written precisely in opposition to them, in the interests of the majority of the order that favoured mitigations of the Rule especially in regard to poverty. For ten years the domain of Franciscan origins was explored and discussed by a number of scholars; and then the whole ground was reviewed by Professor W. Goetz of Munich in a study entitledDie Quellen zur Geschichte des hl. Franz von Assisi(1904). His conclusions are substantially the same as those of Père van Ortroy, the Bollandist, and Friar Lemmens, an Observant Franciscan, and are the direct contrary of Sabatier’s: theLegenda 3 Soc.is a forgery; theSpeculum perfectionisis a compilation made in the 14th century, also in large measure a forgery, but containing an element (not to be precisely determined) derived from Br. Leo; on the other hand, Thomas of Celano’s two Lives are free from the “tendencies” ascribed to them by Sabatier, and that of 1248 was written with the collaboration of Leo and the other companions; thus the best sources of information are those portions of theSpeculumthat can with certainty be carried back to Br. Leo, and the Lives by Thomas of Celano, especially the secondLife. Goetz’s criticism of the documents is characterized by exceeding carefulness and sobriety. Of course he does not suppose that his conclusions are in all respects final; but his investigations show that the time has not yet come when a biography of St Francis could be produced answering to the demands of modern historical criticism. The official life of St Francis is St Bonaventura’sLegenda, published in a convenient form by the Franciscans of Quaracchi (1898); Goetz’s estimate of it (op. cit.) is much more favourable than Sabatier’s.Paul Sabatier’s fascinating and in many ways sympatheticVie de S. François(1894; 33rd ed., 1906; Eng. trans, by L.S. Houghton, 1901) will probably for a long time to come be accepted by the ordinary reader as a substantially correct portrait of St Francis; and yet Goetz declares that the most competent and independent critics have without any exception pronounced that Sabatier has depicted St Francis a great deal too much from the standpoint of modern religiosity, and has exaggerated his attitude in face of the church (op. cit.p. 5). In articles in theHist. Vierteljahrsschrift(1902, 1903) Goetz has shown that Sabatier’s presentation of St Francis’s relations with the ecclesiastical authority in general, and with Cardinal Hugolino (Gregory IX.) in particular, is largely based on misconception; that the development of the order was not forced on Francis against his will; and that the differences in the order did not during Francis’s lifetime attain to such a magnitude as to cause him during his last years the suffering depicted by Sabatier. This from a Protestant historian like Goetz is most valuable criticism. In truth Sabatier’s St Francis is an anachronism—a man at heart, a modern pietistic French Protestant of the most liberal type, with a veneer of 13th century Catholicism.Of lives of St Francis in English may be mentioned those by Mrs Oliphant (2nd ed., 1871) and by Canon Knox Little (1897). For general information and references to the literature of the subject, see Otto Zöckler,Askese und Mönchtum(1897), ii. 470-493, and his article in Herzog’sRealencyklopädie(ed. 3), “Franz von Assisi” (1899); also Max Heimbucher,Orden und Kongregationen(1896), i. § 38. The chapter on St Francis in Emile Gebhart’sItalie mystique(ed. 3, 1899) is very remarkable; indeed, though this writer is as little ecclesiastically-minded as Sabatier himself, his general picture of the state of religion in Italy at the time is far truer; here also Sabatier has given way to the usual temptation of biographers to exalt their hero by depreciating everybody else.

Concerning the life of St Francis and the beginnings of the order, the chief documents that come under discussion are: the twoLivesby Thomas of Celano (1228 and 1248 respectively; Eng. trans. with introduction by A.G. Ferrers Howell, 1908), of which the only critical edition is that of Friar Ed. d’Alençon (1906); the so-calledLegenda trium sociorum; theSpeculum perfectionis, discovered by Paul Sabatier and edited in 1898 (Eng. trans. by Sebastian Evans,Mirror of Perfection, 1899). Sabatier’s theory as to the nature of these documents was, in brief, that theSpeculum perfectioniswas the first of all the Lives of the saint, written in 1227 by Br. Leo, his favourite and most intimate disciple, and that theLegenda 3 Soc.is what it claims to be—the handiwork of Leo and the two other most intimate companions of Francis, compiled in 1246; these are the most authentic and the only true accounts, Thomas of Celano’s Lives being written precisely in opposition to them, in the interests of the majority of the order that favoured mitigations of the Rule especially in regard to poverty. For ten years the domain of Franciscan origins was explored and discussed by a number of scholars; and then the whole ground was reviewed by Professor W. Goetz of Munich in a study entitledDie Quellen zur Geschichte des hl. Franz von Assisi(1904). His conclusions are substantially the same as those of Père van Ortroy, the Bollandist, and Friar Lemmens, an Observant Franciscan, and are the direct contrary of Sabatier’s: theLegenda 3 Soc.is a forgery; theSpeculum perfectionisis a compilation made in the 14th century, also in large measure a forgery, but containing an element (not to be precisely determined) derived from Br. Leo; on the other hand, Thomas of Celano’s two Lives are free from the “tendencies” ascribed to them by Sabatier, and that of 1248 was written with the collaboration of Leo and the other companions; thus the best sources of information are those portions of theSpeculumthat can with certainty be carried back to Br. Leo, and the Lives by Thomas of Celano, especially the secondLife. Goetz’s criticism of the documents is characterized by exceeding carefulness and sobriety. Of course he does not suppose that his conclusions are in all respects final; but his investigations show that the time has not yet come when a biography of St Francis could be produced answering to the demands of modern historical criticism. The official life of St Francis is St Bonaventura’sLegenda, published in a convenient form by the Franciscans of Quaracchi (1898); Goetz’s estimate of it (op. cit.) is much more favourable than Sabatier’s.

Paul Sabatier’s fascinating and in many ways sympatheticVie de S. François(1894; 33rd ed., 1906; Eng. trans, by L.S. Houghton, 1901) will probably for a long time to come be accepted by the ordinary reader as a substantially correct portrait of St Francis; and yet Goetz declares that the most competent and independent critics have without any exception pronounced that Sabatier has depicted St Francis a great deal too much from the standpoint of modern religiosity, and has exaggerated his attitude in face of the church (op. cit.p. 5). In articles in theHist. Vierteljahrsschrift(1902, 1903) Goetz has shown that Sabatier’s presentation of St Francis’s relations with the ecclesiastical authority in general, and with Cardinal Hugolino (Gregory IX.) in particular, is largely based on misconception; that the development of the order was not forced on Francis against his will; and that the differences in the order did not during Francis’s lifetime attain to such a magnitude as to cause him during his last years the suffering depicted by Sabatier. This from a Protestant historian like Goetz is most valuable criticism. In truth Sabatier’s St Francis is an anachronism—a man at heart, a modern pietistic French Protestant of the most liberal type, with a veneer of 13th century Catholicism.

Of lives of St Francis in English may be mentioned those by Mrs Oliphant (2nd ed., 1871) and by Canon Knox Little (1897). For general information and references to the literature of the subject, see Otto Zöckler,Askese und Mönchtum(1897), ii. 470-493, and his article in Herzog’sRealencyklopädie(ed. 3), “Franz von Assisi” (1899); also Max Heimbucher,Orden und Kongregationen(1896), i. § 38. The chapter on St Francis in Emile Gebhart’sItalie mystique(ed. 3, 1899) is very remarkable; indeed, though this writer is as little ecclesiastically-minded as Sabatier himself, his general picture of the state of religion in Italy at the time is far truer; here also Sabatier has given way to the usual temptation of biographers to exalt their hero by depreciating everybody else.

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