7 JANUARY 1905, Page 31

The Words of St. Francis. Selected and Translated by Anne

Macdonell. (J. M. Dent and Co. is. net.)—Frionds of St. Francis have left records of what in other men might be called "Table-Talk." Others of his sayings have come down to us at one further remove, from friends of the Saint's friends. Some of these things Miss Maodonell has put together in this volume, trying, as she tells us, "to reflect his spirit, his temperament, and his attitude to life rather than his doctrine." The result is an admirable little book. One quotation we must make, for it is the praise of a virtue that, some would say, is more practised by the children of the world than by the children of light :—" Know, dearest brothers, that courtesy is one of the qualities of God, who, by His courtesy, maketh His sun to rise and His rain to fall upon the just and the unjust; and courtesy is charity's own sister, punishing hate and keeping love alight." How easy to make applications But then that would not be according to courtesy.