"Francis of Assisi" by Dmitry Merezhkovsky, summary Automatic translate

This book is a philosophical and biographical reflection on the life of the great Catholic saint, published in 1938. The author views Francis as a direct spiritual heir to the Calabrian abbot Joachim of Fiore, who predicted the coming of a new world era.

The Prophecy of Joachim of Fiore

In the twelfth century, Joachim of Fiore experienced a mystical revelation on Mount Tabor. He was revealed the doctrine of three states of the universe: the Age of the Father, the Age of the Son, and the coming Third Testament — the kingdom of the Holy Spirit and absolute freedom. Building on these ideas, the author draws a direct parallel between Joachim and Francis. Both figures categorically rejected private property. For them, materialism and accumulation became synonymous with slavery and spiritual death, and absolute poverty was perceived as the only way to return to pristine bliss.

A stormy youth and a spiritual turning point

Francis was born in 1182 to the wealthy merchant Pietro Bernardone. His mother gave him the secret name John, but the world remembered him by the nickname "little Frenchman" — Francis. The young man traded in expensive fabrics, organized lavish nightly banquets, sang Provençal songs, and bore the title of "king of the fools" among the youth of Assisi. Captured during the war with Perugia, he spent a whole year in prison, maintaining his cheerful disposition and faith in his great future.

His return home was marked by a painful search for truth. His inner breakdown occurred upon meeting a leper. A profound physical revulsion for the disease gave way to overwhelming compassion. The young man dismounted, bowed to the ground before the sick man, handed over his purse of gold coins, and kissed his sore-covered hand. Later, in the dilapidated Church of St. Damian, Francis heard a voice from a blackened crucifix. The voice commanded him, "Renew my crumbling house." Taking the call literally, Francis secretly took the finest fabrics of the fashionable fiery red from a shop, sold them, along with the horse, at the fair in Foligno, and brought the money to the priest. Fearing Pietro Bernardone’s wrath, the priest refused to accept the coins. Francis threw the purse onto the windowsill.

The Bishop’s Trial and the Creation of the Order

The enraged father launched a manhunt for his son. For a month, Francis hid in a dark cellar, tormented by fear. Emerging from his hiding place, filthy and ragged, the young man was taunted by a street crowd. Street urchins threw dirt and rotten eggs at him. Pietro Bernardone beat the young man and locked him in the cellar, demanding the return of the takings. Soon, his mother freed him. The dispute escalated to a public trial before Bishop Guido of Assisi. In front of the town’s leading citizens, Francis stripped off every thread of his clothing, laid his belongings at his father’s feet, and loudly renounced him, acknowledging only the heavenly Lord as his father. The bishop covered the young man’s nakedness with his mantle.

While heading into the mountains, Francis fell into the hands of bandits. They beat him and threw him into a deep pit of melting snow. The young man emerged into a forest clearing and began singing songs of praise to God. Soon, with his own hands, he restored the Church of San Damiano and the Chapel of Our Lady of the Angels in the forested wilderness of the Portioncula Valley. His selflessness attracted followers. The first to give away his possessions was the wealthy merchant Bernardo da Quintavalla. He was followed by Canon Pietro da Cattani and the priest Sylvester. Hearing Christ’s call to preach without money, staff, or shoes during the liturgy, Francis threw off his shoes and girdled himself with a simple rope.

Conflict with the Roman Church

In the summer of 1210, Francis and eleven companions came to Rome to approve the fraternity’s rules. At first, Pope Innocent III viewed the mendicants with great suspicion. The literal fulfillment of the Gospel’s poverty seemed impossible to the prelates. The cardinals feared a rebellion. The situation changed after a prophetic dream: the pontiff saw Francis supporting the collapsing wall of the Lateran Basilica with his shoulder. Upon awakening, the pope gave verbal permission for the preaching of penance. Cardinal Colonna tonsured their heads. The mendicant brothers became men of the Church.

Returning to Umbria, the monks settled in huts made of branches in the village of Rivo Torto. They begged for alms, cared for lepers, and preached peace. Francis forced the warring classes of Assisi to sign a peace treaty. However, his ideals met with resistance even among his fellow monks. Seeing a large stone house in Portioncula built by the townspeople for the order, Francis climbed onto the roof and began throwing off tiles, attempting to destroy the building.

Relations with the official hierarchy grew complicated. Cardinal Ugolino and the calculating Brother Elias of Cortona methodically restructured the Fraternity Minor. A free life gave way to rigid institutional rules. Bowing to pressure, Francis resigned from the leadership of the order, handing over power first to Peter of Catania and then to Brother Elias. He gradually erased the spirit of the original freedom from the rites.

Unity of creations and stigmata

The saint’s most important trait was his relationship with God’s creation. Francis preached to the birds, sang with the grasshopper, and saved waterfowl. During the painful treatment of his blindness with a red-hot iron, he tenderly addressed the fire, asking it not to cause him severe pain. For him, the entire universe became a single ladder of luminous symbols, where the tiniest creature is recognized as a redeemed brother.

In the autumn of 1224, Francis retreated to the inaccessible black rock of Mount Alverno. On the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, at sunrise, a six-winged Seraphim appeared to him, crucified. The vision was accompanied by a secret word. Wounds — stigmata, similar to the wounds of Jesus — opened on the saint’s hands, feet, and right side. Blood oozed from his side constantly. The blessed one carefully concealed the wounds under a thick cassock, showing his companions only the tips of his fingers.

The Last Days of the Blessed

Francis’s health rapidly declined. He became nearly blind and suffered from dropsy and stomach pains. In complete darkness, he composed the famous "Song of the Creatures," praising the Sun, Earth, and Sister Death. Brother Elijah carried the half-dead Francis through Umbrian towns under the guard of an armed military detachment, fearing the theft of his precious body. Arriving in Assisi, the saint became a virtual prisoner in the bishop’s palace.

Sensing his impending death, Francis urgently requested to be transferred to the forest monastery of Portioncula. Along the way, he ordered the stretcher to be stopped and blessed his hometown. On Saturday evening, the brothers fulfilled the dying man’s last wish. They stripped him naked and laid him on the bare ground, intending to leave him there for the time it takes a man to walk about a kilometer. Francis blessed the bread and distributed it to his companions, emulating Christ at the Last Supper. He sang a psalm, thanking God for the opportunity to die free from all earthly bonds. At the moment of his final breath, a flock of larks descended upon the thatched roof of the forest hut.