In the following year Francis Borgia, having been created marquis of Lombay, married Eleanor de Castro, and ten years later Charles V made him viceroy of Catalonia, whose capital was Barcelona. Francis afterwards said that "it was when I was viceroy of Catalonia that God prepared me to be general of the Society of Jesus. I then learned to decide important questions, to settle rival claims to see both sides of an affair, in a way I could not otherwise have done. He was already a different man; "he saw with other eyes and heard with other ears than before: he spoke with another tongue, because his heart also was not the same". He devoted as much time to prayer as he could without prejudice to public affairs or the needs of his growing family, and the frequency of his sacramental communions caused comment, mostly unfavourable -- the prevalent idea, contrary to the practice of the first Christians, was that it was presumptuous in a layman, concerned in the affairs of the world, to receive the Body of the Lord so often. In 1543 St Francis became duke of Gandia by the death of his father, whereupon he retired with his family to his estates, following on the refusal of King John of Portugal to recognize him as master of the household to Prince Philip of Spain, who was about to marry the king's daughter. This was a definite check to the public career of Francis Borgia and he proceeded to interest himself in more personal affairs. He fortified Gandia that it might not be exposed to the Moors and pirates from Barbary, built a convent for the Dominicans at Lombay, and repaired the hospital. The Bishop of Cartagena wrote to a friend at this time, "During my recent stay at Gandia I found Don Francis to be a model duke and a perfect Christian gentleman; humble, truly good, a man of God in every sense of the term... How carefully his children are brought up! How thoroughly his dependents are looked after! How great is his pleasure in the company of priests and religious!..."
This happy and peaceful life at Gandia was brought suddenly to an end by the death in 1546 of Doņa Eleanor. For seventeen years she had been his beloved and faithful companion, and when she lay ill it took all Francis's determination to pray that not his will but God's should be done in her regard. They had had eight children, of whom the youngest was eight at his mother's death. Shortly afterwards Bd Peter Favre paid a brief visit to Gandia, and he left for Rome bearing a message to St Ignatius Loyola that Francis Borgia had resolved to ask to be received into the Society of Jesus -- he had in fact made a vow to do so. St Ignatius received his request with joy; but in his answer advised the duke to defer the execution of his design till he had settled his children and finished the foundations he had begun, telling him in the meantime to study theology at Gandia in the university he had inaugurated there and to take the degree of doctor; he was, moreover, to take every precaution to prevent this astonishing piece of news from being prematurely divulged -- "the ears of the world are not ready for such an explosion". Francis punctually obeyed but was troubled in the following year by being summoned to assist at the cortes of Aragon. He therefore wrote to St Ignatius and as a consequence was allowed to make his profession privately. Three years were enough to see his children properly established and on August 31, 1550, St Francis Borgia set out for Rome. He was yet only forty years old.
After less than four months in Rome, Francis went back to Spain, and retired to a hermitage at Onate, near Loyola. Here he received the emperor's permission to make over his titles and estates to his son Charles, whereupon he shaved his head and beard, assumed clerical dress, and was ordained priest in Whitsun week, 1551. A duke turned Jesuit was the sensation of the day, and when Francis celebrated his first public Mass, for assistance at which the pope granted a plenary indulgence, the crowd at Vergara was so great that the altar had to be set up in the open air. At Oņate the object of all this admiration was set by his superiors to serve the cook, fetch water and carry wood; he made the fire and swept the kitchen; and when he waited at table he had to kneel to beg pardon of the fathers and brothers for having served them with such clumsiness. Directly after his ordination he was allowed to preach throughout Guipúzcoa, and he went through the villages with a bell, calling the children to catechism, instructing and preaching. But within the house the superior treated Father Francis with such severity as he deemed the previous exalted position of his subject required. The saint undoubtedly suffered much during this time, but the only signs of impatience he gave were when he was treated otherwise than as a religious. Once he got a gash in his head, and the doctor who dressed it apologized, "I am afraid, my lord, that I cannot help hurting your grace". "You can't hurt me more", was the reply, "than you are doing by your unseemly manner of addressing me." St Francis's corporal mortifications after his "conversion" became excessive: he was an exceedingly fat man, and his girth decreased very notably; his excesses were now curbed by religious obedience, but he was ingenious in the devising of physical discomforts. In after years he was of the opinion that he had been imprudent in his ways of mortifying his body, especially before he became a Jesuit. He left Oņate for several months to preach in other parts of Spain. Much success attended his labours; many desired to regulate their affairs and their consciences by his advice, and he was one of the first to recognize the greatness of the Carmelite nun of Avila, Teresa. After doing wonders in Castile and Andalusia, he seemed to surpass himself in Portugal, and in 1554 St Ignatius made him commissary general of the Society of Jesus in Spain, an office which he discharged at times with something of the autocracy of a distinguished nobleman. He showed his real spirit when he said that he hoped the Society of Jesus would prosper for God's glory on three things, prayer and the sacraments, the opposition of the world, and perfect obedience. On those things flourished the soul of Francis Borgia.
During his years as commissary general St Francis Borgia was practically the founder of the Society in Spain, establishing in a short time houses and colleges at a score of places. But he did not neglect the immediate care of those whom he had left behind him in the world. He soothed and made sweet the last moments of the queen dowager, Joanna, who fifty years before had gone mad at the death of her husband and had shown a special aversion from the clergy. In the next year, soon after the death of St Ignatius, the Emperor Charles V abdicated, and sent for St Francis to visit him at Yuste. Charles had been prepossessed against the Society of Jesus and expressed his surprise that Francis should have preferred it to so many older orders. The saint removed his prejudices, and said, for the motives which had determined him in his choice, that God had called him to a state in which the active and contemplative life are joined together, and in which he was freed from the danger of being raised to dignities of which he had had enough in the world. He added that if the Society was a new order the fervour of those engaged in it answered that objection; and in any case "Age is no guarantee of goodness". St Francis was no friend of the Inquisition, nor that body of him; and King Philip II listened to the calumnies which jealousy was raising against Francis. He remained on the work of the Society in Portugal till 1561, and was then summoned to Rome by Pope Pius IV, at the instance of the Jesuit general, Father Laynez.
St Francis was most warmly received in Rome and among those who regularly attended his sermons were Cardinal Charles Borromeo and Cardinal Ghislieri, afterwards St Pius V. Becoming acquainted with the work of the headquarters of the Jesuits, he filled high offices, and on the death of Father Laynez in 1565 was elected father general. During seven years he promoted the work of the Society of Jesus in all parts of the world with such success that he might be called a second founder, and the zeal with which he propagated the missions and animated the labourers in planting the gospel in remote countries entitles him to a great share in the conversion of those countries to the faith. He was not less active in directing his religious brethren in Europe for the reformation of the manners of Christians. St Francis's first care was to establish a properly regulated novitiate in Rome and to provide for the same in the provinces. When he first came to the city fifteen years before he had shown a strong interest in the project of a Roman college, and had given a large sum of money therefor. He now concerned himself personally in the direction of the college and the arrangement of its curriculum. In effect he was the founder of this college, but he always refused the title, which is given to Pope Gregory XIII who re-established it as the Gregorian University. St Francis also built the church of Sant' Andrea on the Quirinal, with the adjoining residence, to house the novitiate, began the Gesų, and enlarged and improved the German college which was intended to send missioners to all those northern lands which had suffered from Protestantism.
Pope St Pius V had confidence in the Society of Jesus and a great trust and admiration for its general, so that he could proceed freely with the projects he had at heart. St Francis provided for the extension of the Society of Jesus across the Alps, and established the province of Poland. He used his influence with the French court to obtain a more favourable reception for the Jesuits in France, where he was able to set up colleges. And he was engrossed by the foreign missions: those of the East Indies and the Far East were reformed and those of the Americas begun. St Francis published a new edition of the rules of the Society and drew up regulations and directions for those members who were engaged in special work of various kinds. The work he himself got through in seven years was amazing, and he never allowed it to distract him from the end to which it was directed or to affect adversely his own interior life. Father Verjus wrote, a century later, "It may be truly said that the Society owes to St Francis Borgia its characteristic form and true perfection. For if St Ignatius planned the building and laid the foundations, Father Laynez built the walls, and his successor St Francis roofed it and fitted up the inside, thus finishing the great work of which the design had been revealed to St Ignatius by God." Nor was St Francis so immersed in the responsibilities of his office that he had no time to spare for matters outside. This was shown when in 1566 a pestilence made great havoc in Rome, on which occasion he raised alms for the relief of the poor, and commissioned the fathers of his order two and two, to attend the sick in all parts of the city, with imminent danger to their own lives.
In the year 1571 the pope sent Cardinal Bonelli on an embassy to Spain, Portugal and France, and St Francis accompanied him. Though politically not a great success, it was a personal triumph for the Jesuit. Everywhere crowds clamoured "to see the saint" and to hear him preach, old animosities were forgotten, and King Philip received him as gladly as did his people. But the fatigues entailed were too much for St Francis. He had been for some time in bad health; his infirmities, inclination to retirement, and a deep sense of the weight of his post had worn him out, and at Ferrara on his return Duke Alfonso, who was his cousin sent him from thence to Rome in a litter. He lived for two days only after his arrival. By his brother Thomas he sent his blessing to all his children and grandchildren, and as their names were rehearsed to him he prayed for each one. When he had lost his speech a painter was, with peculiar insensibility, introduced to his bedside. Francis saw him, expressed his displeasure with his dying hands and eyes, and turned away his face so that nothing could be done. He died at the midnight of September 30--October 1, 1572, "one of the sweetest, dearest, noblest men our poor old world has known", as Father James Brodrick observes.
From the time that he began to give himself totally to the divine service Francis Borgia, who was canonized in 1671, learned the importance and difficulty of attaining to humility, and he tried unremittingly to humble himself in the divine presence and within himself. Amidst the honours and respect that were shown him at Valladolid, his companion, Father Bustamante, noticed that he was not only quiet but more than ordinarily self-effacing, for which he asked the reason. "I considered", said St Francis, "in my morning meditation that Hell is my due. I think that all men and even dumb creatures ought to cry out after me, 'Hell is your place'." He one day told the novices that in meditating on the actions of Christ he had for six years always placed himself in spirit at the feet of Judas; but then he realized that Christ had washed the feet even of that traitor, so that he thenceforth felt unworthy to approach even him.
An immense amount of material is now available concerning the life of St Francis Borgia. But most of this, printed in five special volumes of the Monumenta Historica Societatis Jesu (1894-1911), has only been brought to light in modern times. There are over one thousand letters of the saint published in extenso, together with a spiritual diary of his later years and a number of miscellaneous documents relating to his family. These materials have been fully utilized by Father Suau, Histoire de S. Franįois de Borgia (1910), and by Otto Karrer, Der heilige Franz von Borja (1921). Alban Butler had to be content with such earlier biographies as those of D. Vasquez (1585), still in manuscript but reproduced in substance by Father J. E. Nieremberg in 1644, and P. de Ribadeneira, Vida del P. Francisco de Borja (1598). Both Vasquez and Ribadeneira were contemporaries and friends of the saint, but for fear of giving scandal much was suppressed, more particularly concerning Francis Borgia's efforts as a layman to contend with grave abuses in the administration of justice by the grandees and magistrates of Spain. In these early biographies, and most conspicuously of all in that of Cardinal de Cienfuegos, the tone is one of extravagant panegyric, and fictitious anecdotes and marvels are accepted without any examination. The story, for example, that Francis, on viewing the corpse of the Empress Isabella, exclaimed, "Never more will I serve a master who can die", is devoid of historical foundation (Suau, p. 68; Karrer, p. 281). An excellent shorter life of the saint by Suau appeared in the series "Les Saints" (1905), and in English by Mrs M. Yeo, The Greatest of the Borgias (1936). Cf. also Fr J. Brodrick's books on the Origin (1940) and the Progress (1946) of the Jesuits. A very complete bibliography is supplied by Karrer, pp. xi-xvi.
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Here Alban Butler delivers a disquisition on humane studies, in which he says, "Many so learn these sciences as to put on in their thoughts and expressions a scholastic garb which they cannot lay aside so that their minds may be said to be cast in Gothic moulds... Nothing is more horrid than a mere scholar that is, a pedant who appears in the world to have reaped from his studies scarce any other advantage than to be rendered by them absolutely unfit for civilized society." The association of "scholastic garb", gothic, and unfitness for civilized society shows him a true child of the eighteenth century.
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(Butler's Lives of the Saints, Christian Classics, 1995)
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