Abstract: The reputation of gentleness of Francis de Sales could suggest a kind of systematic attenuation of places of conflict, in words or in action; but this is not the case, and he has implemented a vast movement of reformation, fulfilling in the conduct of his diocese what he had successfully experienced in the individual spiritual guidance. That is how he escaped two major pitfalls, going too fast from reformation to revolution, and going too slowly and therefore undertaking and accomplishing nothing.
