Chapter CXL. Of the Provincial Ministers

187. All these qualities the happy father sought for in the Provincial Ministers, though in the Minister-General every one of them ought to be singularly conspicuous. He wished them to be genial toward those beneath them, and to show such gentleness and good-will that delinquents should not be afraid to trust themselves to their affection. He would have them moderate in their orders, forgiving in cases of offence, readier to suffer wrongs than to pay them back, foes to vice, healers to the vicious. In short he would have them such that their life should be a mirror of discipline for the rest. Yet he would have them treated with all honour and valued, as those who bore the burden of care and toil. He declared that those who should govern the souls entrusted to them according to such a pattern and law deserved the highest rewards with God.