that the lay brethren who were then with them, should receive the
Tonsure, and wear small crowns; he even conferred minor orders on them,
and deacon's orders on Francis, whom he constituted Superior General
of all the Religious of the Order of Friars Minor, present and to come.
Those who were present promised obedience to Francis, and Francis
promised to obey the Pope. The pious Pontiff gave this new Patriarch,
with paternal kindness, instructions in various matters which related
to the well-being and strengthening of the Institution, and he assured
him of his peculiar favor; and finally, having embraced each one of
them, he gave them his blessing, and dismissed them filled with joy
and consolation.

We have witnessed these favors renewed in 1723 by Innocent XIII, of
happy memory, the fifth Pope of the ancient and illustrious house of
the Counts of Segni, to which Innocent III belonged. The Holy Father,
assisted by four cardinals, had the goodness to preside at the general
chapter of the Order of St. Francis, held at Rome in the convent of
Ara Coeli, making known to all Christendom on that splendid occasion,
that he looked upon the Friars Minor as his children, as much from
family affection, as from his dignity of Supreme Pontiff.

The illustrious author of the "Variations," who quotes the Abbot of
Ursperg, says that it was to give the Church true poor, more denuded
and more humble than the false poor of Lyons, that Pope Innocent III
approved the institution of the Friars Minor assembled under Francis,
who was a model of humility, and the wonder of the age. The false poor,
who are also known by the name of Vaudois, and are placed in the number
of heretics by Pope Lucius III, assumed the exterior of poverty and
humility, although they had none of the spirit of poverty and humility.
They were filled with hatred of the Church and its ministers, whom