Besides, by thus surrounding their saints with light they make them superhuman creatures, having nothing in common with us; they are privileged characters, marked with the divine seal; they are, as the litanies say, vials of election, into which God has poured the sweetest perfumes; their sanctity is revealed almost in spite of themselves; they are born saints as others are born kings or slaves, their life is set out against the golden background of a tryptich, and not against the sombre background of reality.
By such means the saints, perhaps, gain something in the respect of the superstitious; but their lives lose something of virtue and of communicable strength.

Forgetting that they were men like ourselves, we no longer hear in our conscience the command, "Go and do likewise." It is, then, a work of piety to seek behind the legend for the history.
Is it presumptuous to ask our readers to try to understand the thirteenth century and love St.Francis?
They will be amply rewarded for the effort, and will soon find an unexpected charm in these too meagre landscapes, these incorporate souls, these sickly imaginations which will pass before their eyes.

Love is the true key of history.
A book has always a great number of authors, and the following pages owe much to the researches of others; I have tried in the notes to show the whole value of these debts.
I have also had colaborers to whom it will be more difficult for me to express my gratitude.

I refer to the librarians of the libraries of Italy and their assistants; it is impossible to name them all, their faces are better known to me than their names, but I would here say that during long months passed in the various collections of the Peninsula, all, even to the most humble employees, have shown a tireless helpfulness even at those periods of the year when the number of attendants was the smallest.
Professor Alessandro Leto, who, barely recovered from a grave attack of influenza, kindly served as my guide among the archives of Assisi, deserves a very particular mention.

To the Syndic and municipality of that city I desire also to express my gratitude.
I cannot close without a warm remembrance to the spiritual sons of St.
Francis dispersed in the mountains of Umbria and Tuscany.
Dear dwellers in St.Damian, Portiuncula, the Carceri, the Verna, Monte Colombo, you perhaps remember the strange pilgrim who, though he wore neither the frock nor the cord, used to talk with you of the Seraphic Father with as much love as the most pious Franciscan; you used to be surprised at his eagerness to see everything, to look at everything, to thread all the unexplored paths.