all Tertiaries, unless hindered by sickness or imperative home-duties. By these means we may hope to do something towards regenerating the masses living in positive heathenism in our crowded cities; and thus will a multitude of fresh souls be gathered into the Fold of Christ, and become one Flock under one Shepherd. "Let us begin to serve the Lord our God; for hitherto we have made very little progress." Words of St. Francis in his last sickness. CONTENTS. THE SPIRIT OF THE THIRD ORDER, in seven chapters. PREFACE TO THE RULE AND STATUTES RULE OF THE THIRD ORDER, in twenty chapters or sec- 68 137 147 153 THE SPIRIT OF THE THIRD ORDER. CHAPTER I. ORIGIN OF THE THIRD ORDER, AND THE CONFIRMATION OF THE RULE BY THE HOLY SEE. THE Third Order is the work of God; of this there is no doubt. The eminent sanctity of its Founder, the rapidity of its extension, its development in all classes of society, and the stability of its existence (a stability to which institutions of a purely human origin never attain)-all are proofs of its having been inspired by the Holy Spirit Himself. St. Francis of Assisi was the Saint chosen by God to inaugurate this great work, which is, in fact, to enable people living in the world to practise all the highest precepts of the Gospel, and at the same time to lead, to a certain degree, the life of a religious, by the observance of a distinct rule. This great Saint, born in a period of anarchy and schism, and amidst a universal license of morals which threatened the very destruction B |