THERE existed in the Franciscan Order from an early date a school of asceticism, remarkable no less for great elevation of thought than for singular vivacity and picturesqueness of expression. This two-fold characteristic is perhaps nowhere more happily blended than in Aurea of Blessed Giles of Assisi, a work which the Bollandists do Dot hesitate to rank at the head of its class and which is here presented to the reader in an English dress. No one at all conversant with things Franciscan need be told that Blessed Giles was of that stalwart little band who "were with the Blessed Francis from...