Saint Francis of Assisi · 1181–1226
St Francis of Assisi Quotes
Francis is the most misquoted saint in the Church. The two lines most people can recite — the one about preaching without words, and the peace prayer — are both absent from everything he wrote. What he did write is stranger and better.
On creation
The Canticle of the Creatures is among the oldest surviving poems in Italian, written near the end of his life when he was nearly blind.
“Praised be you, my Lord, with all your creatures, especially Sir Brother Sun, who is the day and through whom you give us light.”
“Praised be you, my Lord, through our Sister Bodily Death, from whom no one living can escape.”
On poverty and possession
His Testament was dictated in his final days and asks that it be read alongside the Rule.
“The Lord gave me, Brother Francis, thus to begin doing penance: when I was in sin it seemed too bitter to see lepers, and the Lord himself led me among them and I showed mercy to them.”
“Let the brothers appropriate nothing to themselves, neither a house, nor a place, nor anything.”
Quotes wrongly attributed to St Francis of Assisi
These circulate widely under St Francis of Assisi's name and are not his. They are listed here so you do not put one in a homily, a bulletin or a citation.
“Preach the Gospel at all times; when necessary, use words.”
Almost certainly the most repeated misattribution in Catholic life. It is in none of his writings or the early biographies, and no version of it is attested before the twentieth century. The Rule he did write instructs his brothers to preach, plainly and with words.
“Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.”
The Peace Prayer of Saint Francis is not by Francis. It first appeared anonymously in the French magazine La Clochette in 1912, nearly seven hundred years after his death, and was attached to his name during the First World War.
“Start by doing what's necessary, then what's possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible.”
No source in Francis or the Franciscan tradition. Modern, and of unknown authorship.
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