THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
system to the plans of the hierarchy which conflicted with the original notions of the founder and helped to bring about the successive changes in the rule already described. Francis was not alone in opposition to this lax and secularizing tendency. On the contrary, the party which clung to his original views and after his death took his " Testament " for their guide, known as Observantists or Zelanti, was at least equal in numbers and activity to the followers of Elias. The conflict between the two lasted many years, and the Zelanti won several notable victories, in spite of the favor shown to their opponents by the papal administration — until finally the reconciliation of the two points of view was seen to be impossible, and the order was actually split into halves.
St. Anthony of Padua (q.v.) has usually been regarded as the first leader of the Observantists; but recent investigations have shown that he was inclined to the opposite side. When Elias sent a delegation to Rome in 1230 to obtain papal sanc- 2 Develop- ^on ^or n^s views> Anthony was one ment to of the envoys; and there is little doubt 1239. The that the bull Quo elongati of Gregory Laxer IX., favoring this side, was due in Party. large measure to his influence. The earliest leader of the strict party was rather Brother Leo, the witness of the ecstasies of Francis on Monte Alverno and the author of the Speculum perfections, a strong polemic against the laxer party. Next to him came John Parens, the first successor of Francis in the headship of the order. In 1232, however, Elias succeeded him, and administered the affairs of the order in the interest of his own party for seven years. Much external progress was made during these years; many new houses were founded, especially in Italy, and in them, without regard to the founder's depreciation of secular learning, special attention was paid to education. The somewhat earlier settlements of Franciscan teachers at the universities (in Oxford, for example, where Alexander of Hales was teaching) continued to develop. Contributions toward the promotion of the order's work came in abundantly, and Elias authorized his subordinates to get around the provision of the rule against the receiving of money, usually by the appointment of agents outside the order, who had the custody of the funds. Elias pursued with great severity the principal leaders of the opposition, and even Bernardo di Quintavalle, the founder's first disciple, was obliged to conceal himself for years in the forest of Monte Sefro.
At last, however, the reaction came. At the
general chapter of 1239, held in Rome under the
personal presidency of Gregory IX., Elias was
deposed in favor of Albert of Pisa, the former
provincial of England, a moderate Ob-
3-RT°1274 servantist- None tne less. Elias' atonaven- ^itude remained widely prevalent in the order. The next two ministers-general Haymo of Faversham (1240-44) and Crescentius of Jesi (1244-47), governed to a great extent in this sense, and had the new pope Innocent IV. on their side. In a bull of Nov. 14, 1245, he even sanctioned an extension of the system of financial
agents, and declared the funds in their custody the property of the Church, to be held at the disposal of the cardinal-protector and not to be alienated without his permission. The Observantist party took a strong stand in opposition to this ruline and carried on so successfully an agitation against the lax general that in 1247, at a chapter held in Lyons, where Innocent IV. was then residing, he was replaced by the strict Observantist John of Parma (1247-57). Elias, who had been excommunicated and taken under the protection of Frederick II., was now forced to give up all hope of recovering his power in the order. He died in 1253, after succeeding by recantation in obtaining the removal of his censures. Under John of Parma, who enjoyed the favor of Innocent IV. and Alexander IV., the influence of the order was notably increased, especially by the provisions of the latter pope in regard to the academic activity of the brothers. He not only sanctioned the theological institutes in Franciscan houses, but did all he could to facilitate the entrance of their teachers to the universities, especially Paris, the headquarters of theological study. It was due to the action of his representatives, who were obliged to threaten the university authorities with excommunication, that the degree of doctor of theology was conceded to the Dominican Thomas Aquinas and the Franciscan Bonaventura (1257), who had previously been able to lecture only as licentiates. In the same year Bonaventura succeeded John of Parma. In spite of his adherence to Observantist principles, Bonaventura took a decided stand against the teaching of Joachim of Fiore, which John of Parma had been inclined to favor. Not a few of the " Spiritual " party, as they were now coming to be called, were condemned to lifelong imprisonment; and for the purpose of discouraging their extreme tendency a new life of the founder was compiled by Bonaventura, at the request of the general chapter held at Narbonne in 1260, and authorized by that of Pisa three years later as the only approved biography. Apart from the severe measures taken against Joachim's followers, Bonaventura seems to have ruled (1257-74) in a moderate spirit, which is represented also by various works produced by the order in his time — especially by the Expositio regulce written by David of Augsburg (q.v.) soon after 1260.
The successor of Bonaventura, Jerome of Ascoli (1274-79), the future Pope Nicholas IV., and his successor, Bonagratia (1279-85), also followed a middle course. Severe measures were taken against certain extreme Spirituals who, on the strength of the rumor that Gregory Continued *■ was intending at the Council of Dissensions. Ly°ns (1274-75) to force the mendicant orders to tolerate the possession of property, threatened both pope and council with the renunciation of allegiance. Attempts were made, however, to satisfy the reasonable demands of the Spiritual party, as in the bull Exitt qui seminat of Nicholas III. (1279), which pronounced the principle of complete poverty meritorious and holy, but interpreted it in the way of a somewhat sophistical distinction between pos-