BLESSED FRANCIS' ESTEEM OF THE VIRTUE OF SIMPLICITY.
Our Blessed Father had the highest possible esteem for the virtue of simplicity. Indeed, my sisters, you know what a prominent place he gives to it in his letters, his Spiritual Conferences, and elsewhere. Whenever he met with an example of it he rejoiced and openly expressed his delight. I will here give you one instance which he told me, as it were exulting over it. After having preached the Advent and Lent at Grenoble, he paid a visit to La Grande Chartreuse, that centre of wonderful devotion and austerity, the surroundings of which are so wild, solitary, and almost terrible in their ruggedness, that St. Bernard called it locus horroris et vastæ solitudinis.
At the time of his visit, the Prior General of the whole Order was Dom Bruno d'Affringues, a native of St. Omer, a man of profound learning and of still more profound humility and simplicity. I knew him well, and can bear witness to the beauty of his character, which in its extreme sweetness and simplicity had something in it not of this earth.
He received Blessed Francis on his arrival with his usual delightful courtesy and sincerity. After having conducted him to a guest chamber suited to his rank, and having talked with him on many lofty and sublime subjects, he suddenly remembered that it was some feast day of the Order. He therefore took leave of the Bishop, saying that he would gladly have stayed with him much longer, but that he knew his honoured guest would prefer obedience to everything else, and that he must retire to his cell to prepare for Matins, it being the feast of one of their great Saints.
Our Saint approved highly of this exact observance of rule, and they separated with mutual expressions of respect and regard.
On his way to his cell, however, the Prior was met by the Procurator of the Monastery, who asked him where he was going and where he had left his Lordship, the Bishop of Geneva. "I have left Him," the Prior answered, "in his own chamber, and I took leave of him that I might go to our cell and be ready to say Matins to-night in choir because of to-morrow's feast." "Truly, Reverend Father," said the Procurator, "you are well up in the ceremonies of the world indeed! Why, it is only a feast of our own Order! Do we, out in this desert, have every day for our guests Prelates of such distinction? Do you not know that God takes pleasure when for a sacrifice to Him we offer hospitality and kindliness? You will always have leisure to sing the praises of God; you will have plenty of other opportunities for saying Matins; but who can entertain such a Prelate better than you? What a disgrace to the house that you should leave him thus alone!" "My son," replied the Reverend Father, "I see that you are quite right and that I have certainly done wrong." So saying he at once retraced his steps to the Bishop of Geneva's apartment, and finding him, there said humbly: "My Lord, on leaving you I met one of our brethren who told me that I had been guilty of discourtesy in leaving you thus all alone; that I should have an opportunity at another time of making up for my absence from Matins, but that we do not every day have a Bishop of Geneva under our roof. I see that he is in the right and I have come back at once to ask your pardon, and to beg you to excuse my apparent rudeness, for I assure you truthfully that it was done in ignorance."
Blessed Francis was enraptured with this straightforwardness, candour, and simplicity, and told me that he was more delighted with it than if he had seen the good Prior work a miracle.