Part 59 (2/2)

Script._, t. 23, pp. 130-226, 229.

[9] _Burchardi et Cuonradi Urspergensium chronicon_ ed., A. Otto Abel and L. Weiland, _apud Mon. Germ, hist._, t. 23, pp.

333-383. The monastery of Ursperg was half-way between Ulm and Augsburg. Vide p. 376.

[10] _Matthaei Parisiensis monachie Albanensis, Historia major_, edition Watts, London, 1640. The Brothers Minor are first mentioned in the year 1207, p. 222, then 1227, pp. 339-342.

[11] See the article, _Minores_, in the table of contents of the _Mon. Germ. hist. Script._, t. xxviii.

[12] _Franz von a.s.sisi_, p. 168 ff.

[13] See above, p. 97, his story of the audience with Innocent III.

[14] For example, _Chronica Albrici trium fontium_ in Pertz: _Script._, t. 23, _ad ann. 1207_, 1226, 1228. Vide Fragment of the chron. of Philippe Mousket ([Cross] before 1245). _Recueil des historiens_, t. xxii., p. 71, lines 30347-30360. The number of annalists in this century is appalling, and there is not one in ten who has omitted to note the foundation of the Minor Brothers.

[15] For example, Vincent de Beauvais ([Cross] 1264) gives in his _Speculum historiale_, lib. 29, cap. 97-99, lib. 30, cap.

99-111, nearly every story given by the Bollandists under the t.i.tle of _Secunda legenda_ in their _Commentarium praevium_.

[16] _Legenda aurea_, Graesse, Breslau, 1890, pp. 662-674.

[17] A good reproduction of it will be found in the _Miscellanea francescana_, t. ii., pp. 33-37, accompanied by a learned dissertation by M. Faloci Pulignani.

APPENDIX

CRITICAL STUDY OF THE STIGMATA AND THE INDULGENCE OF AUGUST 2

I. THE STIGMATA

A dissertation upon the possibility of miracles would be out of place here; a historic sketch is not a treatise on philosophy or dogmatics.

Still, I owe the reader a few explanations, to enable him with thorough understanding to judge of my manner of viewing the subject.

If by miracle we understand either the suspension or subversion of the laws of nature, or the intervention of the first cause in certain particular cases, I could not concede it. In this negation physical and logical reasons are secondary; the true reason--let no one be surprised--is entirely religious; the miracle is immoral. The equality of all before G.o.d is one of the postulates of the religious consciousness, and the miracle, that good pleasure of G.o.d, only degrades him to the level of the capricious tyrants of the earth.

The existing churches, making, as nearly all of them do, this notion of miracle the very essence of religion and the basis of all positive faith, involuntarily render themselves guilty of that emasculation of manliness and morality of which they so pa.s.sionately complain. If G.o.d intervenes thus irregularly in the affairs of men, the latter can hardly do otherwise than seek to become courtiers who expect all things of the sovereign's _favor_.

The question changes its aspect, if we call miracle, as we most generally do, all that goes beyond ordinary experience.

Many apologists delight in showing that the unheard of, the inexplicable, are met with all through life. They are right and I agree with them, on condition that they do not at the close of their explanation replace this new notion of the supernatural by the former one.

It is thus that I have come to conclude the reality of the stigmata.

They may have been a unique fact without being more miraculous than other phenomena; for example, the mathematical powers or the musical ability of an infant prodigy.

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