"In the year 1216, Dominick the Spaniard and Francis of Assise met at Rome. They met and embraced, each recognising in the other the companion predestined to aid the Church in her conflict with the awakening mental energies so long repressed, and in her attempt to guide or crush the aspiring, inquiring, ardent, fervid spirits of the time. Some attempts were made to induce them to unite into one great body their separate institutions. Dominick would have complied: it may be that he thought to find in Francis an instrument as well as an ally. Francis, perhaps from an intuitive perception of the unyielding dogmatic character of his friend, stood aloof. They received from Innocent III. the confirmation of their respective communities, 'and parted,' as it has been well expressed, 'to divide the world between them;' for before the end of the century, nay, in the time of one generation, their followers had spread themselves in thousands and tens of thousands over the whole of Christian Europe, and sent forth their missionaries through every region of the then known world." The rule of St Augustine was the adoption of both. The stricter Benedictine rule, though as we have seen how departed from, enjoined a seclusion from the world. They had, as Mrs Jameson expresses it, "whereever their influence had worked for good, achieved that good by gathering the people to them, not by lowering themselves to the people." The Franciscans and Dominicans, on the contrary, were to mingle with the people, even in all their domestic concerns and affections: they were, in this more intimate connection with the people, to comfort, to exhort, to rebuke. The ministering the offices of religion was not at first conceded to them. They took the more humble title of brothers and sisters of mankind--_frati_ and _suori_--instead of that of fathers, _padri_. The Dominicans called themselves "preaching friars;" the Franciscans, with greater humility, called themselves _Frati Minori_, "lesser brothers." In England they were known as the black and grey friars; but they never reached the popularity or power of the Benedictines in this country. The remarkable feature in the institution of these communities was their admittance of a third class of members, called "the Tertiary Order, or the Third Order of Penitence." These were of both sexes, and of all ranks: they were not bound by vows, nor required to relinquish their secular employments. They were, however, to be strictly moral, and, as far as they might be, charitable. They were never to take up weapon except against the enemies of Christ. "Could such a brotherhood," says Mrs Jameson, "have been rendered universal, and have agreed on the question, 'Who, among men, Christ himself would have considered as His enemies?' we should have had a heaven upon earth." The Franciscans and Dominicans may be considered as one body, the difference being not in