On some of the example and important miracles which occurred during that time after the Bull was obtained.

262 Their conversation was in heaven 263 Popular aura: a) I don’t want to play games with Saint Francis! b) Enlighten this girl! 264 The vision of a young Friar in the friary at Rome 265 The vision of a Dominican 266 The Constitutions of Albacina Why they were called the Constitutions of the Friars of the eremitic life How the early Friars were sustained by the support of the Church

(262) The practice of holy prayer and contemplation, of staying in the wilderness and being recollected among themselves and with seculars was the whole foundation that those servants of God laid. This was the reason many of them had well adapted oratories in the woods. They covered some of these with broom and other lowly materials so that if it rained they could stay there without getting wet and keep them dry. When they were sought ordinarily during the days they were in these oratories. They delighted very much in solitude. And so the Father Guardian knew where they were if the were something he had to ask them to do. This silence and being in the wilderness gave them wide scope to always keep their minds in God. They exercised themselves in taking the discipline. They did this so that it would help them prepare for holy prayer. Many of them said, “If one has no taste in any way for the passion of Christ it seems he is unable to pray.” It often happened that when some friendly secular came and struck up with them he began talk. After having talked with him a good while in the most beautiful discussion, the Friar turned to the secular and said to him, “You are very welcome! When did you come?” Amazed by the this the secular replied to him, “O Father, I have already be speaking with you a while.” Thinking he had only just met him, the Friar said, “Forgive me because I do not remember it.”

This happened because of being perfectly detached earthly things. As the Apostle says, their converse is no longer in this world but in heaven.

The seculars derived the greatest consolation from this and regard them as all saints. Because of their great faith the Lord God worked many great miracles by means of his servants. In all their tribulations they all had recourse to the Capuchins and they regarded all the words the Friars told them as if Jesus Christ had said it to them.

(263) It lasted for many years then that when they established some little friary again in some city or region where they had not been seen, the people ran to see them and listen to them speak, as if they were Apostles. Everyone thought that the Friars performed miracles and that God would reveal to them all they wanted to know.

a) I could give many examples of this, but in order not to weary the reader I will speak of one. The first time the friary was established in Norcia there was an old man who strongly resisted having to give them a little bit of bush which was next to that friary. One of our devotees said to him, “You will see what will happen to you. All these Friars are saints and they speak with Saint Francis, and if they tell him that you are working against them, pity you!” Saint Francis appeared to him the following night and whipped him soundly. Before dawn in the morning he quickly went off to the Friars, more dead than alive. Throwing himself down on his knees he asked forgiveness with many tears. He said to them, “Take all you want! Last night Saint Francis has given me so many blows that he left me for dead. I didn’t believe that you spoke with Saint Francis as I had been told. I don’t want to play games with Saint Francis any more!”

b) What happened at Leonessa when the friary was first established there was no less important. A priest and lay friar went out to quest. A very devout woman had little girl who had been born blind. She grieved very much over this. She had heard that the Capuchins were all saints. The first time she saw the two Friars who went around asking for alms, and she heard them called Capuchin Friars, the woman said, “Poor me! These are those saints to whom Jesus Christ grants what they request. What am I to do? I must be sure to take this poor little girl!” Taking her by the arm she quickly ran after the Friars, crying out. Weeping, she said, “Fathers, Fathers. Enlighten for me this child who was born blind!” When the Friars heard these words they considered them as the words of a woman and of little importance and they didn’t turn around. However, she cried out with tears like the Canaanite woman, “Enlighten this little girl for me!” And she followed them to the door. The priest was embarrassed and annoyed by these words. He faced the woman and said, “Woman, I am not God that I may enlighten those who have been born blind. Be on your way. You are simple.” The woman did not give in yet. Rather, she cried, “I know that you are not Jesus Christ. But you are his servants. He grants everything you ask of him.” Seeing her simplicity and great faith he said to her, “Do you believe that is we pray to Jesus Christ for her that God will enlighten her?” The woman answered, “Yes. I do believe it.” The priest said, “Up then. Come to Mass tomorrow morning and bring her. I will pray for her during Mass.”

The woman came to the friary the following morning. The priest said the Mass of the Saint whose feast occurred that day. A lay novice served the Mass. When it was over he said to the priest, “Go and speak to the woman so that she may give you the blind child.” The novice took her by the arm and led her before the priest. He took the Missal and read her the gospel about the man born blind. When he came to the words where Jesus bent over and made some mud with his spittle, the priest reached down and picked up some earth and spat upon it. With that saliva he made some mud and smeared the mud on the eyes of the little girl. When he came to the words Go to the pool of Siloam he sent the novice and the little girl and her mother to the holy water font and washed her eyes in it. At good crowd was present who had heard Mass. When the little girl felt herself washed and all the people present she opened her eyes. Everyone began to cry, “Miracle! Miracle!” For a long time she stayed with her eyes open. Her eyes had never been seen before, except as closed. They appeared clear and fine much to the joy and wonder of everyone. Then she closed them again and she remained with them closed for fifteen days, even thought they were clear and fair. At the end of the fifteen days she opened them again and could see perfectly. Later, when she grew up, she got married.

I heard all this from the priest himself. Those early Capuchins did these and similar things in all the Provinces. Those things were almost countless but the memory of them is lost because the Friars neglected to have them written down.

(264) They had many revelations that likewise are no longer known. I want to speak about one of them. There was a devout sacristan in the friary at Rome. Once during winter when the nights are long this devout young man found the lamp extinguished. It was the lamp that burned in front of the Blessed Sacrament. He fretted over this. He usually got up each night two or three hours before Matins to go and see if the lamp had gone out. Finding out one night he went to the kitchen to light the flame. There he found three Friars lying around the fire. The devout youth thought they were foreign Friars who slept near the fire because they hadn’t been assigned a place to rest. He said to them, “Oh you poor fellows. I don’t mind telling you that you look quite refresh after having slept next to the fire. Why didn’t you have them give a cell in which to rest?” They answered him, “Have no fear, son. We are not here to do you any evil or to harm you in any way.” The youth replied, “I am not afraid. Who are you?” They said, “We are dead friars. Because we have transgressed the order about staying too long in front of the fire, and because we have spoken idly and wasted a lot of time, the universal just judge has condemned us to purgatory. For our punishment and purgatory he has assigned us to the place where we committed our error which is this fire. Therefore, be on your way so that you may help us a great deal. Commend us to the Father Guardian so that he can have Masses and other prayers said fur us even though we are unworthy for having spent time vainly in the holy Order. The youngster promised them that he would fulfil that duty. For many days the Father Guardian had prayers said for them. One evening the devout youth was resetting the clock. He heard a clear voice that came from above his head in the ceiling. It said to him, “We thank you sacristan for the charity we have received from you and from the other Fathers. You will no longer find us in the fire. Released and purified now through the grace of Jesus Christ we are flying away to heaven.”

(265) This next thing was no less important. There was a lay friar of the Order of Saint Benedict in the friary of Our Lady of the Oak in Viterbo. While he was praying, in an ecstatic vision he saw two dead Capuchin Friars. He saw one who obviously went to heaven straight away. He didn’t see where the other one was. Amazed at this he turned to the Lord and said, “O Lord, what will become of that one?” Immediately it was revealed to him that the Friar went to purgatory for a short time. He saw the friary clearly and the whole scene where the Friars had died. When he returned to his senses that image remained in his mind. Recalling the vision made him ever more fervent and he decided to become a Capuchin. The next morning he left and went in great fervour to Rome. He was received as a novice at the friary at Monte San Giovanni. AS he entered the friary he said to himself, “This is the place where I saw the two dead Friars in the vision.” He disclosed this to the Novice Master and to all the Friars he said, “I beg you to tell me the truth. On such and such a date did a Friar die here in the friary?” He was answered, “On such and such a day and such and such a time two priests died here. Today is the sixth day since they died. One of them was Father Francis of Flanders, Vicar of the Province of Rome. The other was Brother John Mary Bresciano, a simplex priest. The lay Friar knew then that the vision had been real. He persevered in a holy life with in the Order. His name was Brother Valerian and he died a holy death. The Flemish went to paradise and the other to purgatory.

(266) In that Chapter at Albacina they made some very devout Constitutions. They had no sooner arrived at the Friary in Foligno than the Friars who brought them said, “See, we are bringing you the Constitutions! All those poor Friars came running and Brother Francis Cesena, a cleric, began to read them. All the Friars began to cry out of devotion. It was something wonderful that in such a short time such simple Friars composed such concise and substantial Constitutions that were so pertinent to our way of life. Though expanded, the Constitutions that the Congregation has now were later substantially drawn from these in Rome.

These Constitutions were entitled: These are the Constitutions of the Friars Minor called Capuchins of the eremitic life. This was because when Fra Ludovico attempted to obtain a Bull from His Holiness he was advised by a certain reverend Father called Brother Jerome of Sessa. He was from the Camaldolese of the Fratta of Perugia and such a learned and holy man that he was chosen by Paul IV to become a Cardinal. In order to give him the Hat he had him go to Rome. However he succeeded to persuade His Holiness in such a way that His Beatitude let him return to the Fratta. There, not long after, he died. Therefore this Reverend Father advised Fra Ludovico to base his Congregation on that of Saint Romuald – not be united with it as one but like their Congregation and the Order of Saint Benedict. Their Reform bas based on the order of Saint Benedict and they professed a monastic life. Apart from the Rule they have Constitutions to lead an eremitic life. Therefore they had themselves called Hermits of the Fratta. With their Constitutions they came to separate themselves from and be different to the other Monks of the Abbey. So on the one hand they were Monks of Saint Benedict. On the other hand, because of the privileges they had received from many Supreme Pontiffs, they have nothing to do with the Order of Saint Benedict. “Do it hat way,” this holy Father said. “Found your Reform on a solitary and reformed life. While observing the Rule of Saint Francis, be nearer to us by having yourselves called Friars Minor of the eremitic life. In this way you will come to separate yourselves from all the Order of Saint Francis by your habit and way of life. So that His Holiness will not regard this as something novel base yourselves on us. For while we live under the Rule of Saint Benedict, nonetheless the Church allows us this eremitic and withdrawn life. Have yourselves granted our privileges and in this way unite with us so that you will last the effort of obtaining from His Holiness a habit which is different and so remote from the common life of all the Orders which otherwise will regarded as something completely new. And the Prelates of the Holy church always abhor novelty.

Because of this those our early Fathers thus entitled our Constitutions and His Holiness granted all the privileges which the aforesaid Friars of the Fratta enjoy. However those venerable Fathers considered this well and judged this novelty of a Congregation of the eremitic life to be an even greater novelty since there had never been this title in the Order of Saint Francis before. However to make better known to His Holiness and all the Prelates of Holy Church that our Reform is not something new but something old, because in the beginning Saint Francis founded the Order in this habit as well as in the way of living poorly and withdrawn. Therefore the Bull which His Holiness gave us was founded on the early way of life of the Order and that the Capuchins wanted to return to the true observance of the Rule.

Great difficulty came from this about how to make everyone understand that this was the true habit of Saint Francis. The habits preserved in reliquaries and images helped us very much.

(267) As this understanding grew all the Supreme Pontiffs have granted our Congregation all they have requested for the preservation and growth of the Reform. They have done this so kindly and easily many times. In certain particular needs our Fathers did not know whether to ask. Guided by the Holy Spirit the Supreme Pontiffs themselves have provided for the Congregation in such a divine manner that judicious men of sound mind know that God guided the Pontiffs. Just how necessary for the preservation of the Order is union with the Church is seen clearly for without her it would be impossible for the Order to exist. Anyone who reads carefully about the serious problems the Order has had in different times knows that it would have been completely annihilated if God had not freed us by means of the Holy Church and in particular the Supreme Pontiff.

Returning to our early Fathers. With firm deliberation to observe all they had promised God they put all their hope in our Lord God, in his providence and in the governance of Holy Church. Above all they founded themselves in most high poverty which they strictly observed to the point that they were more inclined to the extreme rather than the middle way. One of those Fathers told me that when that Chapter gathered in the hut at Albacina that they had nothing but a few pieces of fruit for food and broken flask of wine. In that little house they found a glass without a stem. They all drank using that. When they had drunk they tipped it upside down, as we said above. These were the choice foods and great provisions that the community was accustomed to make for itself at Chapter time. Those servants of God enjoyed that poverty so much that for a long time after they departed they were more refreshed in their spirit than if they had been refreshed physically by choice foods.