The Franciscans were divided already into the Observants and the Conventuals, but even among the Observants the deteriorating influence of the age had made itself felt. Matteo di Bassi set himself in the convent of Monte Falco to procure a complete return to the original rule of St. Francis, and proceeded to Rome to secure the approbation of Clement VII. In 1528 by the Bull, /Religionis Zelus/ the Pope permitted himself and his followers to separate from the Observants, to wear the hood (/cappuccio/, hence the name Capuchins[3]) which Matteo claimed to have been the dress of St. Francis, to wear the beard, to found separate houses in Italy, and to preach to the people. Soon the Capuchins spread through Italy, and so popular did they become that Gregory XIII. withdrew the regulations by which they were forbidden to found separate houses outside of Italy. The new order suffered many trials more especially after the apostasy of its vicar- general Ochino in 1544, but with the blessing of God these difficulties were overcome. The Capuchins rendered invaluable service to religion by their simple straightforward style of preaching so opposed as it was to the literary vapourings that passed for sermons at the time, by their familiar intercourse with the poor whom they assisted in both spiritual and temporal misfortunes, by their unswerving loyalty to the Pope and by the work they accomplished on the foreign missions, more especially in those lands which had once been the glory of the Church but where religion had been extinguished almost completely by the domination of the Saracen. The revival was not confined, however, merely to a reform of the older religious orders. The world had changed considerably since the constitutions of these bodies had been formulated by their holy founders. New conditions and new dangers necessitated the employment of new weapons and new methods for the defence of religion. Fortunately a band of zealous men were raised up by God to grapple with the problems of the age, and to lay the foundation of religious societies, many of which were destined to confer benefits on religion hardly less permanent and less valuable than had been conferred in other times by such distinguished servants of God as St. Benedict, St. Dominic, and St. Francis of Assisi.