St. Francis of Assisi

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G. K. Chesterton. St. Francis of Assisi

I. The Problem of St. Francis

II. The World St. Francis Found

III. Francis the Fighter

IV. Francis the Builder

V. Le Jongleur de Dieu

VI. The Little Poor Man

VII. The Three Orders

VIII. The Mirror of Christ

IX. Miracles and Death

X. The Testament of St. Francis

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St. Francis of Assisi

by G. K. Chesterton

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X: The Testament of St. Francis

It was no metaphor to say that these people needed a new heaven and a new earth; for they had really defiled their own earth and even their own heaven. How could their case be met by looking at the sky, when erotic legends were scrawled in stars across it; how could they learn anything from the love of birds and flowers after the sort of love stories that were told of them? It is impossible here to multiply evidences, and one small example may stand for the rest. We know what sort of sentimental associations are called up to us by the phrase “a garden”; and how we think mostly of the memory of melancholy and innocent romances, or quite as often of some gracious maiden lady or kindly old parson pottering under a yew hedge, perhaps in sight of a village spire. Then, let anyone who knows a little Latin poetry recall suddenly what would once have stood in place of the sun-dial or the fountain, obscene and monstrous in the sun; and of what sort was the god of their gardens.

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