FRIARS
287
FRIARS
assistance of the King of Spain, their complete separa-
tion from the order, although the semblance of unity
was still rctainetl by the provision of Pius VII, that
the general should be chosen alternately from the
Spaniards and the other nations, and that, during his
term of office, the other division of the onler should be
governed by an autonomous vicar-general. Duiing
1793 and 1794 the order was extinct in France and
Belgium; and from 1803 in most districts in tiermany;
from 1775 on, it was sadly reduced in Austria, and
also in Italy, where it was suppressed in ISIO. The
devastation of the order and the confusion consequent
on it were deplorable. The generals appointed by the
pope, Ilario t'ervelli (1806-14), Gaudenzio Patrignani
(1814-17), Cirillo Almeda y Brea (1817-24), and
Giovanni Tecca of Capistrano (1824-30), ruled over
but a fraction of the order, even though prospects
were somewhat brighter about this period. In 1827,
Tecca published the statutes which had been drawn
up in 17(38. Under the Spanish general, Luis Iglesias
(1830-34), the formal separation of Spanish Francis-
cans from the main body of the order was completed
(1832), but in 1833 most of their monasteries were
destroyed during the Peasants' War and the revolu-
tion. The general, Bartolome Altemir (1834-38), was
banished from Spain and died at Bordeaux in 1843,
Giuseppe Maria Maniscalco of Alessandria (1S3S-44)
being named his successor by Gregory XVI. The
pope also appointed the two succeeding generals,
Luigi di Loreta (1844-50) and Venanzio di C'elano
(1850-56). The former, in 1849, named Giuseppe
Ai-eso Commissary of the Holy Land. In 1851,
Ariiso opened the first monastery at Saint-Palais.
About this period Benigno da Valbona introduced the Reformati into France, and in 1852 fomided their first monastery at Avignon, while Venanzio as general laboured indefatigably for the resuscitation of the Observants in the same country, founding new mis- sions and raising the standard of studies. In Russia and Poland, however, many monasteries were sup- pressed in 1831 and 1842, a general strangulation being afterwards effected by the ukase of 1864. In 1856, at the general chapter in the Ara Coeli at Rome, under the personal presidency of Pope Pius IX, Ber- nardino Trionfetti of Montefranco was elected general (1856-62). The monasteries of Italy were suppressed by the Piedmontese in 1866, during the generalship of RafYaello Lippi of Ponticulo (1862-69) and in 1873 their fate was shared by the houses of the previously immune Roman province. Bowed with grief and years, the general abdicated (1869), and, as a general chapter was impossible, Pius IX preferred one of the Reformati, Bernardino del Vago of Portogruaro (Portu Romatino) to the generalship (1869-89). This general did much to raise the status of the order, and founded, in ISSO, an official organ for the whole order (the "Acta Ordinis Minorum"), which contains the official decrees, decisions, and publications and also many works on canon law and ascetic theology for the discipline of the order. During his term of office the Prussian Kulturkampf expelled the majority of the German Franciscans (1875), most of whom settled in North America, and the French monasteries were suppressed (1880), the scattered Franciscans reassembling in Italy. The Ara C"a>li monastery, the ancient seat of the general's curia, having been seized by the Italian Government to make room for the national monument of Victor Emmanuel, the general was ol)liged to establish a new mother-house. The new CoUegio di S. Antonio near the Lateran was made the seat of the minister general; it is also an inter- national college for the training of missionaries and lectors (i. e. professors for the schools of the order). Bernardino also founded the C'ollegio di S. Bona- ventura at Quaracchi, near Florence, which contains the printing press of the order, and is principally in- tended for the publication of the writings of the great
Franciscan scholars, and other learned works. On the
retirement of Bernardino in 1889, Luigi Canali of
Parma was elected general (1889-97) and prepared the
way for the union of the four reform branches of the
order at the General Chapter of Assisi in 1895. The
reunion is based on the constitutions which were
drawn up under the presidency of Aloysius Lauer and
approved on 15 May, 1897. Leo XIII completed the
union by his Bull "Felicitate quadam" of 4 October,
which removed every distinction between the branches,
even the difference of name, and consequently there
exists to-day one single, undivided Order of Friars
Minor {Ordo Fratrum Minorum, O. F. M.). On the
resignation of Canali as general, Leo XIII appointed
Aloysius Lauer (4 Oct., 1897) of Katholisch-Willen-
roth (province of Kassel, Prussia), who introduced the
principles of the union gradually but firmly, as it
involved many changes, especially in Italy and Aus-
tria. On his death (21 August, 1901) Aloysius was
succeeded as vicar-general by David Fleming, an
Irish friar attached to the English province. At the
general chapter of 1903, Dionysius Schuler, of Schlatt,
in Ilohenzollern, who belonged, like Father Lauer, to
the province of Fulda (Thuringia) and had laboured
in the United States from 1875, was elected general.
He also devoted himself to the complete establishment
of the union, and prepared the way for the general
reunion of the Spanish Franciscans with the order.
At the General Chapter (or more correctly speaking
the Congregalio media) of Assisi on 29 May, 1909, the
order celebrated the seventh centenary of its glorious
foundation.
At present (1909) the Order of Friars Minor includes among its members: (1) two cardinals: Jos^ Sebastiao Neto, Patriarch of Lisbon; created in 1883 (resigned in 1907); Ciregorio Aguirre y Garcfa, Archbishop of Burgos, created in 1907; (2) six archbishops, including Monsignor Diomede Falconio, Apostolic Delegate to the L'nited States since 1907; (3) thirty-two bishops and one prelate nidlius (of Santarem in Brazil); (4) three prefects Apostolic.
II. The Reforji Parties.— A. First Period (1226- 1517). — All Franciscan reforms outside of the Obser- vants were ordered to be suppressed by papal decree in 1506, and again in 1517, but not with complete success. The Clareni are dealt with under Angelo Clareno da CiNGULi; the Fraticelli and Spirituals under their respective headings. The so-called Ca^sarines, or followers of Ctesar of Speyer (q.v.) (c. 1230-37), never existed as a separate congregation. The Amadeans were founded by Pedro Joao Rlendez (also called Amadeus), a Portuguese nobleman, who laboured in Lombardy. When he died, in 1482, his congregation hatl twenty-eight houses but was afterwards sup- pressed by Pius V. The Caperolani, founded also in Lombardy by the renowned preacher Pietro Caperolo (q. V. ) , returned in 1480 to the ranks of the Observants. Tlie Sjiiritual followers of Anthony of Castelgiovanni and Matthias of Tivoli flourished during the period 1470-1490; some of their ideas resembled those of Kaspar Water in the province of Strasburg, which were imiiiediately repressed by the authorities. Among the reforms in Spain were that of Pedro de Villacreces (1420) and the sect called della Capiicciola of Felipe Berliegal (1430), suppressed in 1434. More important was the reform of Juan de la Puebla (1480), whose pupil Juan de Guadalupe increased the severi- ties of the reform. His adherents were known as Guadalupenses, Discalced, Capuciati, or Fralres de S. Erangelio, and to them belonged Juan Zuniarraga, the first Bishop of Mexico (1530-48), and St. Peter of Alcantara (d. 1562, cf. below). The Neutrales were wavering Conventuals in Italy who accepted the Observance only in appearance. Founded in 1463, they were suppressed in 1467. This middle position between the Observants and Conventuals was also taken by the Martinianists, or Martinians, and the
