§ 68. THE MENDICANT ORDERS. 383
The second feature was their devotion to practical activi ties in society. The monk had fled into solitude from the day when St. Anthony retired to the Thebaid desert. The Black and Gray Friars, as the Dominicans and Franciscans were called from the colors of their dress, threw themselves A/ into the currents of the busy world. To lonely contempla tion they joined itinerancy in the marts and on the thorough fares.1 They were not satisfied with warring against their own flesh. They made open warfare upon the world. They preached to the common people. They relieved poverty. They listened to the complaints of the oppressed.2
A third characteristic of the orders was the lay brother hoods which they developed, the third order, called Tertiaries, or the penitential brothers, fratres de poenitentia.3 Convents, like Hirschau, had before initiated laymen into monastic service. But the third order of the Franciscans and Dominicans were lay folk who, while continuing at their usual avocations, were bound by oath to practise the chief virtues of the Gospel. There was thus opened to laymen the opportunity of realizing some of that higher merit be longing theretofore only to the monastic profession. Reli gion was given back to common life.
A fourth feature was their activity as teachers in the universities. They recognized that these new centres of education were centres of powerful influence, and they adapted themselves to the situation. Twenty years had scarcely elapsed before the Franciscans and Dominicans entered upon a career of great distinction at these univer sities. Francis, it is true, had set his face against learning,
1 Hergenrother says, "Chivalry reappeared in them in a new form. In happy unison were blended peace and battle, contemplation and active life, faith and love, prudent moderation and flam ing enthusiasm." Kirchengeschichte, II. 369.
2 " Of one thing," says Trevelyan, "the friar was never accused. He is never taunted with living at home in his cloister and allowing souls to perish for want of food." England in the Age of Wydiffe, p. 144.
3 So called in the bull of Gregory IX.. 1228 ; Potthast, I. p. 703.
384 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1049-1294.
and said that demons had more knowledge of the stars than men could have. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth. To a novice he said, " If you have a psaltery, you will want a breviary ; and if you have a breviary, you will sit on a high chair like a prelate, and say to your brother, ; Bring me a breviary.'" To another he said, "The time of tribula tion will come when books will be useless and be thrown away."1 But from Alexander IV. and his successors the Franciscans received special privileges for establishing schools, and, in spite of vigorous opposition, both orders gained entrance to the University of Paris. The Dominicans led the way, and established themselves very early at the seats of the two great continental universities, Paris and Bologna.2 Their convent at Paris, St. Jacques, established in 1217, they turned into a theological school. Carrying letters of recom mendation from Honorius III., they were at first well received by the authorities of the university. The Franciscans estab lished their convent in Paris, 1230. Both orders received from the chancellor of Paris license to confer degrees, but their arro gance and refusal to submit to the university regulations soon brought on bitter opposition. The popes took their part, and Alexander IV. 3 commanded the authorities to receive them to the faculty. Compliance with this bull was exceedingly distasteful, for the friars acknowledged the supreme authority of a foreign body. The populace of Paris and the students hooted them on the streets and pelted them with missiles. It seemed to Humbert, the general of the Dominicans, as if Satan, Leviathan, and Belial had broken loose and agreed to beset the friars round about and destroy, if possible, the fruit-
1 See the quotations from the Speculum and Vita secunda of Celano, in Seppelt, pp. 234 sqq. Also Sabatier, S. Francois, ch. XVI.
2 For the relations of the mendicant orders with the University of Paris, see Denifle, Chartularium Univ. Parisiensis, I. ; Seppelt, Der Kampf der Bettelorden an der Univ. Paris in der Mitte des ISten Jahrh. ; Felder, Gesch. der wissenschaftlichen Studien im Franciskanerorden bis c. 1250.
3 Chartul, I. 285.