Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. II.djvu/401

377 MONASTIC REFORMS. 377 fore, to break at once from the shackles which chapter bound him to the world, and seek an asylum in — some religious establishment, where he might de- vote himself unreservedly to the service of Heaven. He selected for this purpose the Observantines of the Franciscan order, the most rigid of the monas- tic societies. He resigned his various employments and benefices, with annual rents to the amount of two thousand ducats, and, in defiance of the argu- ments and entreaties of his friends, entered on his noviciate in the convent of San Juan de los Reyes, at Toledo ; a superb pile then erecting by the Spanish sovereigns, in pursuance of a vow made during the war of Granada. ^^ He distinguished his noviciate by practising His severe every ingenious variety of mortification with which superstition has contrived to swell the inevitable catalogue of human sufferings. He slept on the ground, or on the hard floor, with ? billet of wood for his pillow. He wore hair cloth next his skin ; and exercised himself with fasts, vigils, and stripes, to a degree scarcely surpassed by the fanatical founder of his order. At the end of the year, he regularly professed, adopting then for the first time the name of Francisco, in compliment to his patron penance. 15 Quintanilla, Archetypo, p. 11. by the Catholic sovereigns for their — Gomez, Miscellanear., MS., ubi place of sepulture; an honor af- aapra. — Idem, De Rebus Gestis, terwards reserved for Granada, on fol. 4. its recovery from the infidels. The This edifice, says Salazar de great chapel was garnished with Mendoza, in respect to its sacristy, the fetters taken from the dungeons choir, cloisters, library, &c., was of Malaga, in which the Moors the most sumptuous and noted of confined their Christian captives its time. It was originally destined Monarquia, torn. i. p. 410. VOL. II. 48