17. Such miracles, worthy rather of the songs of angels than of the lips of men, show us sufficiently how great was this man, and how worthy that God should choose him to bring back his contemporaries to Christian ways. It was undoubtedly a super-human voice that bade St. Francis, when near the church of St. Damian, "Go thou and uphold my tottering house." Nor is the heavenly vision which presented itself to the gaze of Innocent III. less worthy of admiration, wherein it seemed to him that St. Francis was supporting on his shoulders the falling walls of the Lateran Basilica. The object and meaning of such manifestations are evident; they signified that St. Francis was to be in those times a steadfast protector and pillar of Christendom. Nor, in truth, did he delay about his task.