in his mind. Many of the friars nevertheless adhered to the original rule, taking the name of Spirituals or Observants. The dispute between the two sections of the Order soon waxed warm, and the popes of the thirteenth century had much difficulty in holding the balance between them. It was declared from Rome that whilst the Order were debarred from actual ownership, they were entitled to the usufruct of their acquisitions, the property itself being vested in the Supreme Pontiff. Pope Nicholas III. formulated a bull to this effect. The conscience of the Spirituals was not satisfied by this partial vindication, and the principle involved appeared to them so important that it became almost a new basis of religious faith. Christ and his disciples, they maintained, were voluntarily poor; the possession of wealth was incompatible with apostolic Christianity; poverty was an indispensable note of a true Church. As late as 1322 a general assembly of the Franciscans at Perugia, representing the branches of the Order in every country, adopted the doctrine of evangelical poverty in its fullest sense.
This was logical; but equally logical was the alarm of the Pope and his supporters. For the natural and necessary development of one of the chief factors of pure Christianity was seen to be in direct conflict with the teaching and practice of the Papacy. If the Spiritual Franciscans were right, the Pope, the superior clergy, the monks, the Dominicans themselves, were all unapostolic, not to say anti-Christian. Avignon fulminated at once against these new heretics, and John XXII. did not hesitate
