THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 NOT ONE OF THESE PERSONAGES tJiD I KNOW, BUT 
 THE. SPECTRES. MY ASSISTANTS , BEG.&N TO GIVE "ME 
 THEIR NAMES. 
 
 Vute p. t::. 
 
 London, J.iLttcWd & Son, 187, Piccauliny-.
 
 
 
 Bfl E CO U HT (I
 
 
 LA BRUJA: 
 
 THE WITCH; 
 
 OR, 
 
 A PICTURE 
 
 THE COURT OF ROME : 
 
 FOUND 
 
 AMONG THE MANUSCRIPTS OF A RESPECTABLE THEOLOGIAN, 
 A GREAT FRIEND OF THAT COURT. 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE SPANISH* 
 BY 
 
 MARKOPHRATES. 
 
 LONDON: 
 J. HATCHARD AND SON, 187, PICCADILLY. 
 
 M D C C C X L.
 
 M. BINGLEY, PRINTER, 60, CANNON STREET, CITY.
 
 ?Q 
 
 ONE WORD 
 
 THE TRANSLATOR 
 
 To strip "La Bruja* )J of her beautiful 
 Spanish costume and send her abroad 
 in a foreign dress is a task of no small 
 responsibility, even admitting that 
 the best English cloak bears no com- 
 parison to the Spanish mantilla. I 
 have, however, in exchange for the 
 
 * Pronounced Brook-tia: the Witch. 
 
 878705
 
 (ii) 
 
 garb which she wore in La Mancha, 
 endeavoured so to attire the old lady, 
 as to afford wider scope for the ex- 
 ercise of her vocation, in such parts 
 of the British dominions as may hap- 
 pen to stand most in need of her 
 assistance. 
 
 The portions of the work which 
 are included between inverted commas, 
 it is scarcely necessary to remark, 
 appear to be quotations from the 
 writings of the parties supposed to 
 be speaking. 
 
 The Scripture quotations are from
 
 (iii) 
 
 the Spanish version, and therefore 
 the English reader will not be sur- 
 prised to find that they vary slightly, 
 though not substantially from his 
 own. 
 
 The Notes, I have chiefly gleaned, 
 from a variety of sources. I trust 
 they will be found acceptable to those 
 readers who, from the want of a 
 retentive memory, may have but an 
 imperfect recollection of their early 
 reading, and also to those who have 
 no leisure for reference. 
 
 The Author's original plan of giving,
 
 (iv) 
 
 in notes, a translation of the Latin, 
 I have adopted, with only this dif- 
 ference, that instead of putting such 
 notes at the foot of each page, I 
 have placed them at the end of 
 the Volume. 
 
 It may seem superfluous to recur 
 to the frequently admitted fact, that 
 the English language, with all its 
 copiousness and its adaptability, is 
 inadequate to convey the full mean- 
 ing of many expressions in other 
 languages. Perhaps this remark more 
 particularly applies to passages found 
 in the works of some of the best
 
 (v) 
 
 Castillian authors, in which, much 
 of the force, the grace, the point, 
 the pathos, and the beauty of the 
 original is lost in the best translation. 
 For the truth of this observation 
 need I refer to those English readers 
 who are sufficiently acquainted with 
 the Spanish language to be able 
 to read Don Quixote de la Mancha 
 in the original ?
 
 ERRATA. 
 
 Page 5, line 7. For Bossuet, read Bossueta. 
 
 " 31, 11. For Maria, read Mary. 
 
 " 39, 15. Read marriage of Henry VIII. 
 
 " 40, 14. For Sextus, read Sixtus. 
 
 " 72, 7. For an in, read in an. 
 
 " 82, 19. Read disproportionate. 
 
 " 119, 12. For titular, read twtelar.
 
 TWO SHORT WORDS 
 
 (From the Editor of the Original Work.) 
 
 THERE are things which appear to some 
 people like enchantment, the more they see 
 them with their eyes and touch them with 
 their hands. 
 
 A worthy ecclesiastic, a very good friend 
 of mine had the fortune to die a few years 
 ago, for, as he used to say, one cannot pass 
 beyond old age. I found that he had ap- 
 pointed me executor of his will. I did not 
 delay many hours in taking charge of his 
 money and of his little wardrobe, he having 
 but a scanty stock of these two articles ; 
 not so, however, with his books and manu- 
 scripts. Among these I promised myself the
 
 2 TWO SHORT AVORDS. 
 
 pleasure of finding many dissertations and 
 polemical treatises on the various branches 
 embraced under theology, and even some on 
 the Spanish language, which he had studied 
 all his life with remarkable success ; and in 
 effect I did not deceive myself, their number, 
 it is true, surprised me notwithstanding I was 
 well aware of his great labour and intense 
 application. However, stumbling upon one, 
 in his own handwriting which had the title 
 of " Novela," I rubbed my eyes once or 
 twice, thinking it was a dream ; and using 
 every means to convince myself that I was 
 not mistaken, I found it was a joke with 
 which the respectable old man had, in some 
 leisure moments sweetened the troubles of 
 emigration. Within the brochure [quaderno], 
 I found, besides, a memorandum in his own 
 handwriting, in these words ; / charge my 
 executor that he make such use as to him 
 shall seem fit, of this senile entertainment ;
 
 TWO SHORT WORDS." 3 
 
 but if he shall think its publication useful, 
 I intreat of him that he may not re-touch it, 
 but that he may give it to the world as I 
 have written it, for I do not wish to have 
 heaped upon me any achievements or any 
 errors than my own. 
 
 I preserved my manuscript, and having 
 transferred myself to this capital [Paris] 
 towards the end of May in the present 
 year, [1830] I thought I would immediately 
 print it for the good which might result 
 to Christianity from a knowledge of the 
 abuses of the court of Rome ; abuses so stale 
 and of such extent, that, as Boccaccio beauti- 
 fully puts it, in the second novel of the first 
 Giornata, they tended more than any other 
 thing to the conversion of the rich Jew Abra- 
 ham, who confessed to his friend, Giannotto 
 di Civigni, that he knew there was a divine 
 origin in tlie cliristian religion, when he saw
 
 4 TWO SHORT WORDS. 
 
 that it subsisted in spite of the sins, infamy 
 and atrocities of its principal chiefs, the Popes 
 and their courtiers. But, for all this, a person 
 to whom I communicated my design and 
 shewed the work, observed to me, that who- 
 ever might be bold enough to publish it, in 
 France, would find the unpleasant consequence 
 of his temerity. 
 
 You, sir, added he, in the frank tone of 
 friendship, who are in these days of grace, 
 admitted among us for a short time, and who 
 are narrowly watched by the Police, ought 
 to reckon, to a certainty, on being expelled, as 
 soon as " The Witch, " is sent forth to be 
 noised abroad tliroughout this kingdom. I 
 reflected on this judicious observation, and 
 waited for a ministry less fanatical which 
 
 might clip the wings of Jesuitism that were 
 
 \ 
 then taking such a rapid flight, or, rather, 
 
 until there might break in upon France the
 
 TWO SHORT WORDS. 3 
 
 dawn of a morning more favorable to liberty. 
 The persecutions which some persons, a short 
 time previously, had suffered for their alleged 
 witchcraft in this illustrious nation, made it 
 evident that the government was ardently de- 
 siring to renew the auto-da-fd ,and to submerge 
 the Bossuet, the Fleurises, the Fenelons, the 
 Montesquieus and the Voltaires, of the country 
 in the chaos of the barbarism and ignorance of 
 the middle centuries. Fortunately, the grand 
 week of the people, according to the happy 
 expression of Layfayette, has placed in evidence 
 before the most blind, how short a space of 
 time is necessary to overthrow institutions and 
 governments which do not keep pace with the 
 progress of civilization. The present gene- 
 ration of France, re-uniting within itself the 
 valour and boldness of heroic times, the gene- 
 rosity of the ages of chivalry and the learning 
 and illustriousness of the present era, has let 
 itself loose, unarmed, in the arena against its
 
 TWO SHORT WORDS. 
 
 prepared and armed oppressors, has conquered 
 them, has pardoned them; and, bridling up 
 its own ardour, in the moment of achieving 
 victory, has delivered itself up peaceably, to 
 consolidate its own felicity and that of its de- 
 scendants by means of wise, prudent and free 
 institutions. Such was the noisy event to 
 which " The Witch" owes her publication, 
 hidden until this day in a comer, fearful of suf- 
 fering under the anathema which, against those 
 of her class, was, at that time fulminated by the 
 perfidious or deluded clergy. 
 
 Returning, however, to speak of her con- 
 tents : I knew very well that her author did not 
 behold, with a favorable eye, the lords of the 
 papal chancery, nor the three-corner-hatted (') 
 assistants of the company, and that if robbed 
 of a book, or if his sorry mess of hotch-potch 
 should happen to be badly cooked by the 
 kitchen maid, he would attribute all to a
 
 TWO SHORT WORDS. 7 
 
 Jesuitical conspiracy ; and he had arrived at 
 the belief that there were true faries dressed 
 in short cassocks, who were constantly attend- 
 ing to his well being and to his days ; but I 
 never could have pictured to myself, that a 
 man accustomed to grave studies and in the 
 midst of a thousand privations, and at a very 
 advanced age, could have remaining, humour 
 to flourish the pen against the court of Rome, 
 giving to us an ingenious production, some- 
 thing similar to the " Diablo Oy'uelo of Velez 
 of Guevarre at the festival, and much more in 
 the purity and nerve of the language. 
 
 I certainly could have wished that " The 
 Witch " might have been less erudite and that 
 she might not have spoken so much Latin ; 
 however,not being able to avoid complying with 
 the last wishes of the author, for I do not wish 
 to have to do with the spirits of another world, I 
 liave translated, at loot, all the Latin iu order
 
 TWO SHORT WORDS. 
 
 that the lector lego, ( 2 ) with whose free will and 
 consent the head has remained integral, may 
 understand them ; and out of respect to the 
 injunction of my friend. 
 
 If, afar in yon etherial regions, where with- 
 out doubt he is, enjoying that repose due to his 
 virtues, it is given to the blessed to take part 
 in what befalls mortals who were their com- 
 panions ; his spirit, full of celestial jubilee will 
 delight itself, at the short, wise and happy 
 revolution of France, which announces ages of 
 peace and of liberty to all Europe. This 
 striking picture will not, withal, prevent him 
 turning his attention, for a moment, to the 
 remembrance of those who have prided them- 
 selves in being his friends, and then he will 
 see, in the scrupulousness with which I execute 
 his orders, in giving to the light " The JVitch" 
 the purest tribute of my respect to his 
 commands.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 (Qf the Author.) 
 
 DISTURBED and dismayed scamper about 
 the witches, when the inquisitors give thanks 
 to God. ( 3 ) But then are there witches ? 
 Yes, would that there were not. In our time, 
 there is the Nun whom the Inquisition of 
 Valladolid brought to trial "for flying and 
 other excesses" Many times has been repeated 
 the victory which followed with the zeal of the 
 Holy Office against the precious jewels of 
 Zugarramurdi, ( 4 ) in truth, the searchers in 
 France are after them at this present moment. 
 And yet it is thought strange that the Apostles 
 of the Peninsula cry out for the stake and the 
 c
 
 10 PREFACE. 
 
 burning piles to be restored to their ancient 
 condition ! What know they of religion, or of 
 zeal for religion, these enemies of the altar and 
 of the throne ? Obstinate in their incredulity, 
 they let loose the tongue and continue gabbling 
 that there are no witches, and yet, to that 
 person who inadvertently says something upon 
 ointments, or flights, or nocturnal dances in the 
 air, they give a colouring of gold and blue : 
 some say that person is a Frenchman, others 
 a deluded or fanatical creature, or one who 
 bears, suspended on his breast, the badge of 
 the inquisition. 
 
 Well, my good sirs, fortunately for me, I 
 can say to those of you who read, or hear read, 
 this book, that I, who am its author, am not a 
 Frenchman : and how could I be, if born in 
 Toboso near the palace of Dulcinea? Of 
 delusion I have not one jot ; and the proof of 
 it is, that I read at every meal the Ethics of
 
 PREFACE. 11 
 
 fjusembaum, illustrated by Liquorio, and the 
 revelations of that servant of God, Margaret 
 Alacoque. Eschewing fanaticism, I associate 
 with the members of the company of Jesus, 
 now wandering about in La Mancha, and I 
 carry my perpetual scapulary as a Jesuit of the 
 short cassock [so tana corta]. Perhaps I may 
 still have remaining in me some small relic of 
 the inquisitor, as, for two years I was peeping 
 into the purses of the people % of my native 
 town, being formerly its tax-gatherer. 
 
 Not having, then, any one who is able to 
 throw in my face any of those decorations 
 which, in justice to these, innovators, are 
 necessary to them in order to the belief in 
 witches, I am authorised to assert that there 
 are such, and that the inquisitiors have a right 
 to broil them, and that the French have a right 
 to hunt them. I do not write this out of spite 
 nor out of ill-will ; for these witches have done
 
 12 PREFACE. 
 
 me no wrong ; on the contrary, much good ; 
 although by a means not very clean and which 
 has cost me some money ; for which I grieve 
 like a good manchego and a faithful Christian. 
 I speak not now with a view, of evincing 
 my penitence for the temptation into which 
 I fell, but to convince the obstinate and the 
 incredulous, that the race of witches is not yet 
 extinct nor exterminated ; which is the theme 
 of my discourse. 
 
 I would give an eye, if all those presump- 
 tuous critics would form a circle round him 
 who now proceeds in the reading of this pro- 
 logue. One by one, more or less, would go 
 out striking his breast and saying : I accuse 
 myself, father, for I am the deluded one. If 
 perchance there may be one of these gentlemen 
 among my audience, I am going to ask him a 
 single favor, and that is, that he may hear me 
 without prejudice, as a faithful historian, for
 
 PREFACE. 13 
 
 I come from a stock that will not sell a cat for 
 a hare. The veracious Cide Hamete Benen- 
 geli, was professor to my fifth grandfather in 
 the university, when he went about tasting the 
 wines in the cellars of Valdepenas. And, 
 if this be insufficient to recommend my in- 
 genuousness, I appeal to the school of men- 
 tal restrictions which there is in one of my 
 colleges. 
 
 The only but which my account contains, 
 and I confess it without being put to the tor- 
 ture, is, the being somewhat heavy. However, 
 my dear friends, would it be just that I should 
 leave in the inkstand the third or the fourth 
 part of that, which my Witch made me see 
 with those eyes that will one day be consumed 
 by the earth ? This unboweling of accounts I 
 hate to the death. I shah 1 not strip the bowels 
 of mine for the world : it must be swallowed 
 entire by those who desire it ; and he who
 
 14 PREFACE. 
 
 does not, let him be assured that he looses a 
 great treat. There are in it strange occur- 
 rences and no sounds nor even dreams by 
 Patillas. 
 
 I will bet a hundred to one, that he who 
 comes to digest a couple of leaves of this curi- 
 ous romance, does not let it loose from his 
 hand, and that he repeats the saying of the 
 blessed friar who drank off the cup of Malaga 
 wine : hasta verte buen Jesus, ( 5 ) a picture of 
 our Saviour being painted at the bottom.
 
 THE WITCH.
 
 THE WITCH. 
 
 SEATED on my bed one night in this very month 
 of September reading, as I accustom myself, 
 in order to conciliate sleep, the general history 
 of the world ; I took a turn from this lecture to 
 a volume which treated of modern Rome, 
 when I found myself engulphed in that mare 
 magnum( 6 ) of incredible and stupendous events. 
 Without knocking at the door and without say- 
 ing, I step in here for it rains, without any 
 note of previous advice or other intimation 
 usually resorted to by those who introduce
 
 18 THE WITCH. 
 
 themselves among people of good breeding, a 
 scarecrow placed itself right before me, which 
 appeared like the old woman who, they say in 
 my village, deceived St. Anthony. If I must 
 say the truth, I was startled, and something 
 more, for I found that my hair stood on end. 
 I feel a little restrained in making this confes- 
 sion ; but, either it is history, or not history. 
 The historian ought to be ingenuous : truth for 
 thy forehead ; and above all, do no harm and 
 fear no wrong. 
 
 Who art thou ? I asked her, terrified : and 
 what winds have brought thee here between 
 cockcrowing and midnight ? I was advised in 
 my council, answered she, that thou art reading 
 of the frauds and fabulous stories which this 
 great ugly book recounts of Rome, and I come 
 to furnish thee with means, by which, in this 
 very moment, without any trouble, thou may- 
 est see with thine eyes, that which this court
 
 THE WITCH 19 
 
 lias T^een in the latter ages, and that which it 
 now is. 
 
 Art thou a woman, or a devil ? said I : how 
 can I see any thing of the kind from my cot- 
 tage, and when all the world is sleeping with 
 extended limb ? Dont let us waste our spittal, 
 replied the old woman : either thou dost or 
 thou dost not desire my assistance. If thou 
 dost not, there is an end of the business ; but 
 if thou hast a longing in the matter, it is a done 
 thing. A whirlwind of doubts, of terrors and 
 of remorse poured down upon me. In my life, 
 said I to her, I have never attempted any thing 
 with a Juggler. With that gentleman, an- 
 swered she, I have nothing to do nor do I 
 even know him by sight ; all my science is re- 
 duced to this phial. No doubt she carried one 
 in her hand, for in the moment she showed it 
 to me, and it was certainly as black as though 
 it were full of ink. There is in this phial ^
 
 20 THE WITCH. 
 
 balm, continued she, of such virtue, that by 
 only allowing thee to anoint thy temples and 
 the tips of thy fingers, thou wilt, in one instant, 
 be able to run over centuries and thousands of 
 leagues, and to walk upon the air, not like 
 those in balloons at the mercy of the North or 
 South winds, but in wind or in calm, with the 
 quickness of thought, and, what is more, to 
 place thyself amongst people wheresoever thou 
 wilt without any one of them seeing so much as 
 a hair of thy head. 
 
 After going to such a length, I asked her : 
 when shall I return to my house ? This 
 same night, she replied, thou will find thyself 
 at home safe and sound as if no such thing had 
 happened. 
 
 Then thou art a witch, said I ; so they have 
 been pleased to call us, sir, answered she ; but 
 I am only a modest woman of Huete, and
 
 THE WITCH. 21 
 
 respected by all the town ; in the day time I 
 spin, and at night I occupy myself in holy 
 works: I fly to whither I am sent by my 
 council, which is never but to serve my 
 neighbours. Always some little salary or 
 small gratuities are falling in, and with these 
 I manage to pay for the hire of my house. I 
 put to her three questions following each other, 
 on the place of her meetings, the number of 
 her companions, and the ritual of her confra- 
 ternity. But she answered to none of them, 
 alledging that she should lose her very skin 
 in the disclosure of these secrets. 
 
 Already then, seeing that it was a business 
 of money, and that she did not ask anything 
 which might bring about other consequences ; 
 overcome by an accursed curiosity, I fell into 
 the snare, and drawing out an ounce of gold, 
 in giving it to her I said : anoint me, and if
 
 22 THE WITCH. 
 
 the enterprize turn out according to my wishes, 
 reckon on another. The ointment was such, 
 that in the twinkling of an eye, I found myself 
 on one of the steep and barren mountains of 
 the Moon. 
 
 The old woman I saw no more. 
 
 From behind one of the peaks a gallant youth 
 thrust out his head, and saluting me with 
 strange courtesy, said : this globe which thou 
 seest in thy front, is the earth from whence 
 thou hast just come : that piece of land in form 
 
 of a sleeve, which is between two seas, is 
 
 Italy ; and that which appears like a cheek 
 with pimples, is Rome, founded upon moun- 
 tains. Observe those persons who appear 
 like fleas : those are the cardinals ; and those 
 others which crawl about like dirty lice and 
 chigoes [niguas] are the domestic prelates and
 
 THE WITCH. 23 
 
 monsignori and chamberlains and auditors, and 
 courtiers, and ushers, that form the large, 
 strange and motley group [comparsa] of the 
 capital of the world. 
 
 This is not my bargain, good friend, said I 
 to him : what do I gain by seeing this minature 
 at such a distance? The picture of Rome 
 that I wish to see, is, as it is in itself, in such 
 manner that one may be able to distinguish the 
 persons by the color of their hair and by their 
 features ; and not only those of the present, 
 but also of past times ; this is what has been 
 offered to me. I know nothing of any such 
 bargain, said the youth : I have been entrusted 
 with the charge of placing thee where thou 
 mightest be able to observe Rome, as it now 
 is, as well as that which it has been, in those 
 epochs which thou chosest to name ; and even 
 to provide thee with some cicerone, in case that 
 thou shouldest ask for one. But, none of this.
 
 24 THE WITCH. 
 
 said I, can I obtain if thoii dost not place 
 me within shot. And what cicerone can 
 explain to me at this altitude, who those 
 little animals are, that in bulk are scarcely to 
 be seen larger than a bug, even viewed through 
 a good telescope ? It is easy for me, said he, 
 to suspend thee in the air, or to transfer thee 
 to the top of one of the highest mountains of the 
 earth, whichever may seem to thee the most desir- 
 able, be it the Chimborazo, or the peak of Tene- 
 rife, or some one of the Andes, or of the 
 Alpujaras. The plan of being suspended in 
 
 the air, my friend, said I, does not suit me. 
 I remember one Icarus, ( 7 ) who to his cost had 
 wings ; and another, ( 8 ) who from a slack rope 
 of an aerostatic globe, gave himself a somerset 
 upon the poplars of Aranjuez, and broke his 
 legs. 
 
 Those peaks and mountains which thou hast 
 named to me, will have all the altitude that
 
 THE WITCH. 25 
 
 thou desirest; but in that way I should see 
 Rome from them as from the mountains of 
 Ubeda. ( 9 ) 
 
 Then let us do another thing, said he, and 
 that is, do thou put one foot in the sea of 
 Sardinia and the other in the Adriatic, in such 
 a manner that thou mayest dam up the Tiber 
 between thy legs, and bid it escape. This is 
 jugglery, said I : I have given my money in 
 order that thou mayest carry me to Rome ; for 
 thou confessest having had this charge confided 
 to thee. Distant places are good for war and 
 for music : the Babylon of Rome cannot well be 
 seen but from within the walls; and again, 
 I have paid the posting of my journey ; 
 to Rome we must go, it is all very well 
 for boobies to lick up only half the honey 
 which is given them, but that will not satisfy me. 
 
 Thy mouth shall be measured, said the youth: 
 
 E
 
 2G THE WITCH. 
 
 shut your eyes. I did so, and on opening 
 them, I found myself on the cupola of the 
 Church of St. Peter. This is, said he, the 
 greatest wonder of the world. It may be so, 
 I replied ; but yet thou seest not in it, what 
 I see. What ? The blood of Spaniards with 
 which it is dyed. Art thou ignorant that since 
 the time of Charles V, Spain has been sending, 
 annually, for the support of this fabric, more 
 than three hundred thousand reals ? ( 10 ) Sum 
 up the account of millions which this contribu- 
 tion will amount to in the space of almost three 
 centuries. And at the same time only consider, 
 that there are in that kingdom innumerable 
 parochial churches only half built, others dis- 
 mantled, in a most wretched state of poverty 
 and destitute of decent ornaments. Out of 
 such resources I would undertake to fill the 
 world with wonders ; although I should not 
 even wish to bring to mind, the dangerous 
 recourse to indulgences, of which Leo X. for-
 
 THE WITCH. 27 
 
 merly availed himself in order to this work. 
 Do not say any such thing, rejoined the 
 youth, for this is the mother of all churches. 
 I have seen no mother, said I, who would 
 suffer herself to be gaily attired whilst 
 surrounded by her daughters covered with 
 rags- 
 
 13ut what are we doing here ? let us see this 
 wonder. Without the need of stairs, I found 
 myself in front of the portico. I raised my 
 eyes to the front of the temple, and in it I did 
 not find the nobleness and the simplicity 
 which is seen in that of the E*curial. ( u ) I 
 stepped back to observe the Cupola, and 
 found it so distant from the peristyle that it 
 seemed to belong to some other church. This 
 defect, said I, Herrera avoided in his church 
 of St. Lorenzo, formed after the plan of a 
 Greek cross : in this of Rome they would have 
 avoided it also if they had only followed the
 
 28 THE WITCH. 
 
 plan of Michael Angelo Buonarrotti. At the 
 entrance by the gates I saw at one glance that 
 the fluted columns were after the very worst taste; 
 for the construction of which, Urban VIII. took 
 the bronzes from the Pantheon : I was alarmed 
 at the winged giants by the fonts of holy water, 
 and by the multitude of colossal statues which 
 represented persons, who in their lives, were 
 not so great ; though they had been able to 
 make play with the grandeur of the edifice, 
 but not with those who enter it to offer their 
 devotions. It is not the colossal dimensions, 
 that make a temple magnificent ; but the style, 
 the consonance in the orders of the archi- 
 tecture, and the majesty which pertains to the 
 house of God. 
 
 Groups of foreigners were passing to and 
 fro, admiring the master-pieces of the fine arts 
 which adorn this vast edifice : it seemed to me 
 as if it were a museum, or a gallery of pictures,
 
 THE WITCH. 29 
 
 or a cabinet of natural history. One was prais- 
 ing the mosaics, another the basso relievos, 
 another the statues, another the pictures, ano- 
 ther the paintings in fresco : they were disput- 
 ing about the authors, the ciceroni were laugh- 
 ing within themselves, and deciding in a 
 magisterial tone. To one booby, who was 
 going about staring from one side to another I 
 whispered, nothing of this which you are admir- 
 ing is the temple : these are but as the furni- 
 ture of a house ; take them away and it is 
 converted into a dove cot. Strip this grand 
 edifice of its multitude of precious works, which 
 attract the artists and the curious: would it 
 then merit, for its mere structure, that which it 
 now merits for its ornaments ? Neither you 
 nor others would ever remember to visit it. 
 The contrary would follow if it were compa- 
 rable with the ancient temples of this very 
 capital, or with those of the Greeks, or the Egyp- 
 tians^ whose noble and simple architecture, dis-
 
 30 THE WITCH. 
 
 daining meretricious ornaments, enchants and 
 elevates the soul. 
 
 One near me, was lamenting that the millions 
 buried within those dungeons had not been 
 employed in draining off the Pontine marshes ; 
 I said to him: the expences would have been 
 better employed in opening or in finisliing the 
 canals of Spain. A sculptor was conjecturing 
 that the bronze statue of St. Peter was that of 
 Jupiter, found in the ruins of the Capitol. A 
 nice transformation it has been, said he, to con- 
 vert a gentile deity into an apostle, by only put- 
 ting a wreath of laurel on his head and the 
 keys into his hand ! You are, said I, mistaken : 
 it is not the same statue of Jupiter Capitolinus, 
 but one which out of the bronze of Capitolinus, 
 was made by St. Leo the Great, in acknow- 
 ledgement of Rome's having been preserved 
 from the ferocious attacks of Atila. He began 
 to laugh and turned his back upon me. This
 
 THE WITCH. 31 
 
 joke brought to my mind one Saint Bias, in a 
 certain town, who, by the cutting off' of his false 
 whiskers, and adding a crown with its diadem, 
 was converted, every month, into the virgin of 
 the rosary. 
 
 A Scotchman, who was going about copying 
 the epitaphs from the sepulchres, in the memo- 
 randa of his collection called this church a 
 cemetery ; he put a long note upon the mauso- 
 leum of the queen of Sweeden, Christina Alex- 
 drina, and of Maria Clementina, queen of 
 England ; he took notes for writing a commen- 
 tary upon the statue of the Emperor Henry 
 IV, who was kissing the feet of Pope Hilde- 
 brand on the sepulchral stone of the princess 
 Matilda. A cicerone observed, that this 
 was a thought of Urban VIII, by whose order 
 that sepulchre was formed by the Chevalier 
 Bernini.
 
 32 THE WITCH. 
 
 At a few paces we found the sepulchre of 
 this Pope with his bronze statue. One of the 
 bystanders said to me : it is on this account 
 that the inscription says, Quod non fecerunt 
 barbari, fecerunt Barberini ( 12 ) ; and, asking 
 him to explain that enigma, he answered me, 
 that it alluded to the ruin of the Pantheon, caused 
 by him, and by his nephews, with his permis- 
 sion, in order to erect a palace ; they took 
 in one night, by the hands of some thousands 
 of workmen, innumerable marbles, even some 
 of those which remained in the proud Colli- 
 seum or Amphitheatre of Agrippa. Although 
 there are, said I, those who hold this Pope a 
 greater barbarian for having denied to Louis 
 XIII and to Louis XIV, the title of Kings of 
 Navarre, at the same time that he conceded 
 to the cardinals that of most eminent.
 
 THE WITCH. 33 
 
 sepulchre of Paul III. This Pope, said a 
 cicerone, wished to make Erasmus a cardinal ; 
 but he declined to be one. This anecdote, 
 said I, is no small honor to the memory of 
 both. He created Duke of Parma, said ano- 
 ther, his son Peter Louis. This, said I, was 
 not so honorable, because it was at the expence 
 of the holy see. It would appear that nei- 
 ther the dukedom of his son, nor the marriage 
 of his daughter with Vosio Sforza turned to 
 good account, for in his last illness he often 
 repeated : si mei non fuissent dotninati, tune 
 immaculatus essem. ( 13 ) 
 
 Passing further on, we came to the sepulchre 
 of Innocent XII. Blessed Pope ! exclaimed 
 an Oxford professor; who made all the sacred 
 college sign the bull in which is prohibited 
 all species of excesssive complaisance, of the 
 Popes in favor of their nephews, obliging the 
 cardinals, present and future, to conform them- 
 F
 
 34 THE WITCH. 
 
 selves to it and to ratify it with an oath in 
 every conclave, and that the Popes-elect should 
 swear to its observance. This bull is waste 
 paper, said a certain masked personage of 
 our gossiping committee. How so ? Then, 
 said I, do not the Cardinals observe the Pope's 
 bulls and their own oath? It is mere form, 
 answered the incognito. Besides, how can 
 you prove to a Pope that any thing is ex- 
 cessive in complaisance towards his kindred ? 
 This may be evaded by a cunning scholastic ; and 
 if not, it may be transferred to the nephews of 
 PiusVI, and to the Dukedom of Nemi, which the 
 infernal tongue of Pasquin called Nemini. ( 14 ) 
 
 Near this was the sepulchre of Sixtus IV, 
 with bronze basso relievos, the classic "produc- 
 tion of Palayolo. I recollect, said I, that 
 this Pope gave, in perpetual commendam, the 
 bishopric of Zaragoza to a child of six years 
 old, called Alfonso, the illegitimate son of
 
 THE WITCH. 35 
 
 Ferdinand, King of Naples. An abbot of 
 mean appearance, who must have been a Jan- 
 senist, began to censure this appointment ; 
 but I, in the haste of my survey, did not 
 afford him the opportunity. 
 
 A cicerone pulled me by the coat, telling 
 me that I must wait, if I wished to see, in 
 that chapel, two of the columns of the temple 
 of Solomon. I could not, on hearing this, 
 refrain from laughing. What art thou laugh- 
 ing at ? said he, in a fit of anger. Then I 
 suppose thou dost not even believe that from 
 the same temple was taken the other column, 
 which is in the first chapel adjoining to the 
 Holy door, and which, according to tradition 
 supported our Lord Jesus Christ whilst he 
 was preaching. 
 
 As to these traditions, said I, there are many 
 like this in vogue now-a-days : and if you
 
 36 THE WITCH. 
 
 dispute it, I refer to the plate used at the last 
 supper and so religiously venerated in Geneva, 
 although it has already been proved, that it 
 was manufactured more than a thousand years 
 after the time of Christ. In a reliquary of a 
 certain Carthusian convent they showed me 
 two pieces of stick, such as those used by our 
 muleteers, and wished to persuade me that they 
 belonged to the Judges of Israel. In another 
 monastery, they preserve a small stone from 
 the torrent of the brook Kedron ( l5 ) ; and to 
 a person who dared to ask the monks whether 
 it was of the stones or of the water of that 
 stream, they answered that he ought not to 
 make a mockery of their reliques. In the same 
 manner thou wouldest answer if I were to ask 
 thee of which of the temples of Solomon are 
 these columns ; and this question would be in 
 perfect order. 
 
 With this dialogue we arrived at the sepul-
 
 THE WITCH. 37 
 
 clire of Benedict XIV. It is much to be 
 lamented, said the Oxford professor, that this 
 Pope, so commendable for his learning and 
 for his virtues, should have permitted certain 
 maxims and political schemes to be practised 
 in his court and on the pontifical throne. 
 The Jesuit Patouillet jeered him, reproducing 
 in the dictionary of the books of the Jansenists 
 the Jansenistic Library of Father Colonia, 
 which he, the Pope, had himself condemned. 
 In like manner mocked him also those who 
 translated into Italian and into Spanish, the 
 history of the people of God, by the Jesuit 
 Berruyer, against which he had made a decree 
 censuring it as a false book of pelagianism and 
 of socinianism. Against these enemies of the 
 truth and of religion he maintained, up to the 
 last, the decorum of the holy see. I did not 
 venture to reply to this, notwithstanding that, 
 from the good fathers of my college, I had heard 
 other language.
 
 38 THE WITCH. 
 
 We passed on further to the sepulchre of 
 Clement X, for, just at that moment another 
 cicerone had pointed it out to us, and given us 
 to understand that the real Pope of his time 
 was his adopted nephew, the Cardinal Altieri. 
 It is no wonder, said the Oxford professor, 
 that this old man of eighty-six and full of 
 infirmities should have entrusted to another, 
 part of the burden of his office. May not 
 other lazy prelates, said the incognito, who 
 are neither Popes, nor old men, nor invalids, 
 excuse themselves by this example ? 
 
 The sepulchres of the Popes Leo I, II, III, 
 aud V which are in another chapel, gave rise 
 to a lengthened altercation between the profes- 
 sor, the incognito, and two of the ciceroni; the 
 sum and substance of which was to compare 
 the Rome of that age with the Rome of the 
 present : they were almost on the point of 
 throwing their caps at each other. A great
 
 THE WITCH. 39 
 
 crowd of the curious who were perambulating 
 the temple soon began" to form a circle ; a 
 verger and two sacristans were presently upon 
 the spot ; I, with my associate and a cicerone, 
 slipped off, for I was always an enemy to dis- 
 turbances. 
 
 On coming to the sepulchre of Clement VII. 
 the league., called holy, of this Pope with vari- 
 ous sovereigns against Charles V, was presented 
 to my notice ; and the imagination, which is a 
 horse without a bridle, made me leap back 
 three centuries. I retroceded to that period, 
 and saw Clement a prisoner in the Castle of St. 
 Angelo, a fugitive at Orvieto in the garb of a 
 merchant, disposed to declare null the marriage 
 Henry VIII with Catherine of Arragon, and 
 then again resolved to declare it valid. The 
 cicerone wishedto recount to me this history but 
 I would not give him a hearing, telling him, that 
 I already knew it sufficiently, and that it was
 
 40 THE WITCH. 
 
 very painful, adding, that the intention of the 
 Pope in the steps taken by him in that delicate 
 business, had originated from a false policy, 
 which never lost sight of its own interests. 
 
 On coming to the chapel which serves as 
 the choir of the canons of St. Peter, we saw 
 the sepulchre of Innocent VIII. A Bolog- 
 nian Barrister was also observing it. What a 
 pity it is, said he, on turning round to me, that 
 this Pope, who was a perfect model of meek- 
 ness and beneficence, fell into the weakness 
 of excommunicating and dethroning Ferdi- 
 nand, King of Naples, for denying to pay the 
 feudal tribute of his kingdom from which Six- 
 tus IV had exempted him. Though I take 
 it to be more lamentable, said I, that he should 
 have invented the expression motu proprio, ( 16 ) 
 unknown to ancient Popes, who never promul- 
 gated decrees concerning the universal church 
 but with the assent and accord of its synod.
 
 THR WITCH. 41 
 
 Very sweet, indeed, ought to be the command- 
 absolute, said the lawyer, smiling, when even 
 the servants of the servants of God, ( n ) roll it 
 in the mouth as a savory morsel. 
 
 Are we to be all the year registering sepul- 
 chres ? said I to the young man who accom- 
 panied me : no, must I not see that which I 
 desire of the most signal epochs of Rome ? 
 Simultaneously with the uttering of these 
 words, disappeared the people from the temple ; 
 and not only the people but ^the youth also, 
 in whose place two phantoms had put them- 
 selves, one on each side of me, which brought 
 upon me more dismay than even the sudden 
 appearance of the Witch. A door, but not the 
 one by which we had entered, suddenly opened 
 itself, neither was it the holy one, which is only 
 used in the time of jubilee ; nor was it one of 
 the other three, but one more like an opening 
 in the wall from top to bottom ; and by the 
 
 G
 
 42 THE WITCH. 
 
 fissure, which was of the space of four yards 
 at least, began to enter a procession of defunct 
 persons, which did not fail to strike me speech- 
 less for the moment. 
 
 Not one of these personages did I know, but 
 the spectres, my assistants, began to give me 
 their names. The first, which was the Pope 
 Hildebrand, was carrying a standard of 
 burnished gold, and on it was this in- 
 scription : Teman los Reyes el supremo 
 poder de los Papas : Let Kings fear the 
 supreme power of the Popes: the tassels 
 were supported, that on the right by Boni- 
 face VIIL, and that on the left by Julius 
 II. By the side of Boniface went an old man 
 disputing with him : it was the Prophet Jere- 
 miah, whom that Pope was wishing to per- 
 suade, that to him and the other pontiffs were 
 addressed the words : Yo te estableci sobre 
 reyes y reinos, I have established thee wer
 
 THE WITCH. 43 
 
 kings and kingdoms. ( 18 ) Behind these came 
 the Cardinal Beno saying: it is not Boni- 
 face, but Gregory who is the inventor of this 
 idolatry. But a vast crowd who walked near 
 him imposed upon him silence, saying : 
 knowest thou not that of this holy Pontiff it 
 was said : He shall have dominion from sea to 
 sea ?( 19 ) Among this vast multitude, the Car- 
 dinal de Porto rose conspicuous, shouting that 
 the words of Jeremiah denoted the temporal 
 jurisdiction which the Pope held over nations 
 and princes. The Jesuit Salmeron was spur- 
 ing him on, citing the Bull in which Paul III. 
 dethroned Henry VIII. 
 
 There followed, as it were a band of musi- 
 cians of various voices, but very accordant, 
 which under the direction of the Jesuit Suarez 
 went on chanting spiritual songs in honor of 
 the temporal power of the Popes. To the 
 sound of the harp of David, a treble was sing-
 
 44 THE WITCH. 
 
 ing : " all the Kings of the earth shall adore 
 him and shall serve him r'^ 20 ) a tenor followed : 
 *' he shall reign in the house of Jacob for 
 ever.'*( ai ) 
 
 These having ceased, other four chanted 
 " thou shalt also suck the milk of the nations 
 and shalt be fed at the breast of kings."( 22 ) 
 To which all the chorus answered " Divine is 
 the majesty of the Pope : lion of the tribe of 
 Judah,( 23 ) root of David, the Saviour and 
 liberator of Israel." Whilst I was, with great 
 pleasure hearing this melody, there came out 
 from among the musicians one who they told 
 me was called Eneas Silvio, ( 24 ) and he whis- 
 pered in my ear, do not thou make cause with 
 these profaners of Scripture : sunt intcrprcta- 
 tioncs paparum, suasfimbrias intendentium. ( 25 ) 
 
 When all this farsical procession had passed 
 tmd that sweet music had ceased, I saw enter
 
 THE WITCH. 45 
 
 Alexander VI, with his daughter Lucretia and 
 his four sons, priding himself in the saint which 
 from his loins was to be given to the church 
 and giving orders to his butler relative to the 
 bottles which he had prepared for his last 
 supper in the vineyard of the Cardinal Adrian 
 Cornetto. ( 26 ) 
 
 In great haste, and without order came va- 
 rious Popes : Julius III was carrying in his 
 hand the bull in which he excommunicated 
 Henry II King of France ; and St. Pius V 
 the Bull in which he dethroned Queen 
 Elizabeth. By his side four musicians of his 
 chapel went singing in a chanting tone, the 
 following words, which he applied to Don 
 Jolm of Austria, the illegitimate son of 
 Charles V, after the victory of Lepanto : 
 Fuit homo, missus a Deo, cut nomen erat 
 Johannes. ( 27 ) Some of the aulics were asking 
 Pius VI what he was thinking of doing
 
 40 THE WITCH. 
 
 with Vircenti the nuncio of Spain, anil lie 
 answered VINCENTI dabo manna absc&ndit.i/m, 
 ct nomen navum. (^) Leo X went singing 
 the triumph which he had achieved against 
 the pragmatic of Charles VII in the treaty 
 with Francis I. Behind him went the Car- 
 dinal Orsi, giving an echo to that which 
 had been said by Charlas and by Thomasino 
 against the authenticity of the pragmatic sanc- 
 tion of St. Lewis. Attached to the tail of 
 this Cardinal came several persons crying out 
 Pravilegia, non privilegia.^} Who are these ? 
 said I to my conductors, and what are they 
 saying? These, said one of them, are the 
 theologians who have approved the work of 
 Rocaberti on the Roman pontifice. Pra- 
 vilegia, in their mouths, signifies the articles 
 of the Galican clergy ; and they are applaud- 
 ing the zeal with which that Archbishop 
 treated as heretics those who deny the infalli- 
 bility of the Pope ; and as impious and
 
 THE WITCH. 47 
 
 schismatics those who do not consider him 
 invested with power to depose princes. 
 
 My conductor ceased speaking, and those 
 theologians continued : King of kings and Lord 
 of lords. Good God, I exclaimed,that I should 
 hear them repeating that which is written of 
 Jesus Christ in the Apocalypse. Of Jesus 
 Christ ? answered my companion : it is of the 
 Pope they are saying it ; and if you doubt it, 
 listen for a moment. They continued crying : 
 " In spiritual and temporal the Pope possesses a 
 power, of which in vain the heretics wish to 
 deprive him." 
 
 By the opening appeared a large picture, 
 which,from its size could scarcely be brought in, 
 representing the murder of the Hugonots of 
 France on the day of St. Bartholomew. Over 
 it, was this inscription : Pontifex Colignii ne- 
 cem probat. ( 30 ) It must have been a great
 
 48 THE WITCH. 
 
 weight, for the Cardinal of Lorena, who was 
 carrying it upon a most elevated pole, was 
 drenched with perspiration. At his side went 
 the Cardinal Alexander, nephew of the Pope, 
 who had been his legate in France, and was 
 exclaiming : " Blessed be God that the king 
 has fulfilled to me his word."( 31 ) At the heels of 
 this Cardinal followed, in two files, all the 
 sacred College presided over by Gregory XIII. 
 One of my phantoms said to me : these are 
 now going to the churches of St. Mark and St. 
 Lewis to give thanks to God for this grand 
 triumph, which has accompanied the catholic 
 religion. And what sword is that said I, which 
 this Chamberlain carries behind? It is, said 
 he, the present which the Pope has prepared 
 for Charles IX. 
 
 The horror which this mixture of religion 
 with the shedding of human blood caused me, 
 had not yet passed away, when I saw enter 
 Sixtus V, surrounded by Cardinals and pre-
 
 THE WITCH. 49 
 
 lates, his face burning as though carried away 
 in a frenzy of passion ; comparing the assassi- 
 nation of Henry III, King of France, by 
 James Clement, to the incarnation of the 
 Word and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. 
 Turning from this robbery, a certain aulic 
 remonstrated with him for having excommu- 
 nicated the King of Narvarre and Prince of 
 Conde, and for having absolved his subjects 
 from their oath of allegiance. Sixtus turned to 
 him and said that the Pope was superior to all 
 the potentates of the earth, and was instituted 
 in order to dethrone infidel princes, and to 
 precipitate them, as the ministers of Lucifer, 
 into the infernal abyss. 
 
 There was a short interval, and I then saw 
 enter two Popes weeping bitterly. Who are 
 these most holy fathers ? I asked my interpre- 
 ters. That one on the right, they answered, 
 is St. Peter Celestine, who is lamenting in the 
 H
 
 50 THE WITCH. 
 
 Castle of Fumona the ingratitude with which 
 lie was there shut up by Boniface VIII., after 
 having been induced by him to renounce the 
 tiara. The other is Adrian VI., who aban- 
 doned himself to a perpetual grief, when he 
 saw how utterly imposible it was to remedy 
 the abuses and abominations of his court. 
 
 I was struck with a fearful surprise by four 
 flaming swords, which entered as though they 
 were flying, one after the other through the 
 aperture. I was obliged to step aside to prevent 
 my head being severed [revanar] from my 
 body at a stroke, and I said : what swords are 
 these? The two first, answered a knowing 
 fellow, [trujiman] are the bulls of Innocent 
 X. and of Alexander VII. , upon Jan son, who 
 divided the clergy of France, and caused there 
 the most lamentable devastations. The other 
 two are the bulls Unigenitm and Avctorein, 
 /fc/e?'( 32 ) which serve as a knife to the doc-
 
 THE WITCH. 51 
 
 trine of the church. Following these swords, 
 came Pius VI. and Pius VII. flagelating 
 a code which had this title : Tlie four pro- 
 positions of the Galican Church. Pius VII. 
 was persuading a French bishop who was with 
 them, that he might, in his own country, preach 
 those very errors which had already been con- 
 demned by Innocent XL The bishop smiled 
 and said : most blessed father, let us postpone 
 this aflair till the pontificate of your successor : 
 then we shall see wonders. 
 
 Suddenly there entered a multitude of Popes, 
 their eyes being raised towards a placard which 
 the master of the sacred palace was carrying 
 aloft with this inscription: A copy of the dona- 
 tion of Constantino . In the distance were seen 
 Lorenzo Vala ( 33 ) and Lewis Antonio Mura- 
 tori ( 34 ) winking the eye at each other. The 
 former was saying : let this be aggregated with 
 the decrees of Isidorus ; and the latter : thou 
 hast well spoken, for it is a copy, and not the
 
 52 THE WITCH. 
 
 original ; it is a port'on of the same tart which 
 was kneaded in the time of Stephen III. and 
 of Adrian I. This they said in a low tone of 
 voice ; having been tutored by experience from 
 the burning of some catholics at Strasbourg 
 who had refused to believe in this fable, and 
 warned by that which had happened to a Friar, 
 who, having doubted the donation of Ludovico 
 Pio, was within an ace of being made a tenant 
 of the Inquisition. But sirs, said that Friar, 
 how could Ludovico Pio give to the Popes, 
 Sicily and Calabria, if he did not possess 
 them ? He added : the most ancient writer 
 who insists on this donation, is Leo of Ostia, 
 who died at the beginning of the twelfth cen- 
 tury. If I am a heretic so was Pagi before 
 me, for he held for apocryphal this galantry as 
 well as the other. 
 
 I was much amused by a high personage 
 who entered hand-in-hand with St. Peter, and
 
 THH WITCH. 53 
 
 was asking him to acknowledge as his own, a 
 letter which that apostle was supposed to have 
 written to Pepin. The enquirer seemed fully 
 persuaded that it was authentic, and out of it 
 he brought forth I know not how many argu- 
 ments in favor of the temporal authorities of his 
 successors. The apostle, however, left him 
 very coolly, merely answering that he had never 
 despatched any courier^ 35 ) and that in order to 
 know if the letter was his, the best plan would 
 be to compare it with the two in the Bible. 
 
 What new procession is that, said I ? A 
 new group of Popes, headed by Paul III 
 carrying ben3ath his cloak the bull In coend 
 Domini.^} This procession terminated in a 
 complete scuffle, for Clement XIV came out 
 unexpectedly, from a small chapel in which 
 he had been concealed, and was extinguishing 
 the candles and throwing water upon the 
 ashes in the censers carried by some French
 
 54 THE WITCH. 
 
 bishops. It was surprising to see how nimbly 
 an abbot could glide away from them with a 
 box on his shoulders, lined with damask, and 
 upon which was this inscription Secret pro- 
 tests of the Popes agaimt the ceding of their 
 pontifical rights, made, but which, at present 
 cannot be enforced; to be used by them in 
 prosperous times. 
 
 Let us get out of this place at once, said I 
 in an angry tone ; the night is passing on, and 
 I shall not see Rome, or at least I shall only 
 have half a measure of my honey ; and then 
 will come the Witch for the other ounce of 
 gold. 
 
 I was much grieved at this haste, and par- 
 ticularly so, because the first thing that my two 
 sacristans now presented to my eyes was the 
 burning of the unhappy Antonius Palearius de 
 Verli,( ;i7 ) who had committed the great crime
 
 THE WITCH. 55 
 
 of saying that the Inquisition was a stab to 
 the literati. My hair stood on end like 
 bristles, when I heard them confess as a 
 dogmatical truth, that, in certain cases, the 
 Pope had the power of inflicting death upon 
 heretics by his own hand ! Near, to me was 
 the famous dominican friar and theologian 
 Silvestre Prierias, who, on perceiving the 
 compassion which I could not help evincing 
 for that most learned man, said to me : dost 
 thou not know that St. Paul, although he 
 has not commanded us to burn heretics, has 
 told us to kill them ? ( 38 ) and this not as he 
 wishes but by order of God ? St. Paul ? 
 answered I : and where ? It is a command of 
 his, continued he, ut hcereticos devitemus ( 39 ) 
 very good said I ; but is this to kill them ? 
 Thou art sadly behind in thy Latin, replied 
 the theologian : devitemus is de vita prive- 
 w^^^.s.( 40 ) Without doubt, father, said I, you 
 have lost your reason; none but a madman
 
 56 THE WITCFJ. 
 
 could so far bewilder himself. Mad or not 
 mad said friar Silvester, I understand this 
 text secundurn inter pretationem sarictissimi 
 domini nostri papce. ( 41 ) I cannot, said I, 
 acquit this Pope without calling you an im- 
 postor. Is it possible that the Pope should 
 be ignorant of the rudiments of the Latin 
 language ? or that he can believe the blessed 
 apostle wrote his letters in it ? Besides ; by 
 what rule does he apply to heretics that 
 which St. Paul said to the Corinthians in 
 allusion to an incestuous person ? and that 
 too, not in order that they should kill the in- 
 dividual, but that they might endeavour to 
 promote his repentance ; which having been 
 accomplished, they were commanded to treat 
 that person with indulgence and to console 
 him. Now if you have forged this devitemm 
 from the words of the Apostle to Timothy : 
 et hos devita ,*( 42 ) you ought to know, that 
 these words do not allude to heretics, but to
 
 THE WITCFI. 57 
 
 lorers of thetmelres, to the covetous, tlie 
 proud the ungrateful, the disobedient to their 
 masters, and to other vicious persons, from 
 which the court of Rome is not exempt. Con- 
 sequently if devitare might be rendered de vita 
 prware, it would be necessary that your inqui- 
 sition , in order to comply with this precept of 
 the apostle, should commence burning and 
 strangling right and left from the capitol even 
 to the Transtibertine suburbs. 
 
 An abbot who overheard our conversation 
 said to me : thou canst not have read our bulls ; 
 dost thou not know that one of the propositions 
 of Luther condemned by Leo. X. in the bull 
 Exurge domine, says, that the burning of he- 
 retics is contrary to the will of the Spirit ? 
 This spirit of burning, said I, will be that of 
 the court of Rome, but not of the Holy Spirit ; 
 for if it were so, it would follow to be the will 
 i
 
 .S THK WITCH. 
 
 of the Holy Spirit to bum heretics ; and of this 
 thou canst not present to me one single proof. 
 
 I know not how, but the head of Cardinal 
 Belarmino ( 43 ) made its appearance, just at this 
 very moment ; and, acquainted with our dis- 
 pute, he wished to persuade me that the here- 
 tics themselves ought to give thanks to the in- 
 quisitors, or, to the secular arm to whom they 
 were consigned. Just look brother, said he to 
 me with much blandness, " at the obstinate 
 " heretics ; to kill them is to their own interest, 
 " for the longer they live, the more errors they 
 " invent, and pervert a greater number of per- 
 " sons, making themselves deserving of more 
 " severe condemnation." 
 
 And how do you reconcile this, said I, with 
 that which Jesus Christ said : " I have no plea- 
 " sure in the death of a sinner, but rather that 
 *' he should be converted and live." " Oh ! " re-
 
 THK WITCH. 59 
 
 plied the theologian Prierias: " the saints of the 
 ' ' primitive church would perhaps have exceeded 
 " but qualified with homicide, that which we now 
 " do in killing and in burning heretics ; which 
 " undoubtedly, in our time, if done with a right 
 " intention, so far from being sinful, is a work of 
 " great merit. And therefore the inquisitor, in 
 " sitting upon his tribunal ought not to let go 
 " his hold, until the heretic goes headlong 
 " to the flames ; (Donee confusibiliter sit 
 " combustusj ( 44 ) and this in order that he may 
 " glorify himself in the Lord for havingdefended 
 " the church." I did believe, father, said I, 
 that the church defended herself by sound doc- 
 trine, by patience, by meekness, and by a good 
 example. Undoubtedly, answered he, thou 
 oughtest to be among the new heretics. This is 
 condemning the court of Rome, which says, 
 " all those who will not follow the holy church 
 " of God and the apostolical chair, ,. she 
 11 burns, or throws into the Tiber, or awards
 
 60 THE WITCH. 
 
 " to them some other kind of death," But at 
 least, she will hear them ? said I. " Hear 
 " them?" returned he," she makes herself deaf 
 " to him who asks to be judged or heard in a 
 " tribunal : (nan attento quod voluerint stare ju- 
 " dicio aut rationem redder e.)( 45 )" I am sorry to 
 say, father, that this is making herself the court of 
 homicide, or the court of a bloody tyrant. No it 
 is not, replied he, for it ought not to attempt, 
 now, to convince heretics. And why ? said I. 
 Because they are loquacious and cunning. 
 And were there not also, said I, in the time of 
 St. Stephen, pharisees and scribes, whom he 
 tried to convince with the power of the divine 
 word ? Time, said he ; but you do not know 
 the difference of the times : the Holy Spirit is 
 not able to resist the loquacity and astuteness 
 of the heretics of the present time, as formerly : 
 Non potest ita resistere spiritus sanctus hodie, 
 sicut. fecit tempore sancti Stephani.^ 6 ) And 
 therefore it is very proper that they should be
 
 THE WITCH. 61 
 
 condemned without being heard : Ut occidan- 
 tur antequam audiantur.^ 47 ) 
 
 I could not contain myself at hearing such 
 an accumulation of nonsense. And I told him, 
 that with the cloak of religion he was a true 
 enemy of the spirit. Already I know you, 
 already I know you, he exclaimed with great 
 zeal : I will bet any thing you please that you 
 are one of those infatuated beings who " in- 
 " terpret the holy scriptures by the head, and 
 " not according to the decision of the court of 
 " Rome." 
 
 With this he took himself off, whirling 
 amongst the crowd, and in order to escape 
 from the risk with which I saw myself menaced, 
 I had recourse to my power of becoming 
 invisible. 
 
 I next found myself close to the Tiber; and
 
 62 THE WITCH. 
 
 the first persons I there saw, were some fisher- 
 men dragging, from the river, the dead body 
 of a Pope. 
 
 What dead person is this ? said I to one of 
 them. The Pope Formoso, lie answered, who 
 was thrown into the river by Stephen VI. 
 Then had you two Popes at one time ? said I. 
 No, said he, only Stephen VI, who succeeded 
 Formoso, if we except the reign of Boniface 
 VII, who was a Pope only fifteen days, ordered 
 this Pope Formoso to be disinterred, and 
 having placed him in the patriarchal chair, 
 dressed in his pontifical robes, and allowed him 
 a lawyer that he might defend himself, as though 
 he Avere alive and upon his trial ; he then 
 condemned and degraded him, and ordered 
 his head and three of his fingers to be cut off, 
 and that his body should then be thrown into 
 the Tiber. But this tragi-cornedy did not end 
 here : he deposed as many as Formoso had
 
 THE WITCH. 63 
 
 ordained, and ordained in their stead those who 
 lent themselves to hisproceedings. This surely, 
 was frenzy, said I. Others believe it was his 
 weakness, answered the fisherman, and these 
 first shut him up in an obscure cell, afterwards 
 loaded him with irons, and then hanged him. 
 
 Whilst those fishermen were carrying the 
 remains of the venerable pontiff to be re-in- 
 terred, I saw near me, guided by a Lazarillo,( 4S ~) 
 the presbyter Benedict, whose eyes had been 
 torn out from their sockets by his spiritual son, 
 Pope John XII. I heard at the same time a 
 great tolling of bells, which was for the inter- 
 ment of the Card'nal sub-deacon John, whom 
 the same Pope had killed by a means which 
 it is not decent to mention. 
 
 I arrived at the gates of the city, and saw, 
 within them, a crowd of people scampering 
 along towards the interior. Where are those
 
 (54 THE WITCH. 
 
 people going ? said I to a guard. To see a 
 new spectacle, answered he : John XVII, 
 whom the partisans of Otho III hold to be 
 Anti-pope ; they have cut off his nostrils and 
 a piece of his tongue ; and to complete the 
 fete, our most holy father, Gregory V, orders 
 liim to pass about the streets, dressed in rags, 
 mounted on a jackass, with his head towards 
 the tail. 
 
 I had not recovered from the shock which 
 this cruelty had given me, when I saw the 
 celebrated historian Platina ( 49 ) carried away 
 as a prisoner, for being suspected of a con- 
 spiracy against Paul II. I made myself once 
 more invisible, and followed him. Well, so 
 thou also, said the Pope to him, conspirest 
 against me, following the example of Calli- 
 machus? Platina answered him boldly, 
 vindicating himself from that calumny, in order 
 that his innocence might not even be put in
 
 THE WITCH. DO 
 
 doubt. The Pope, ungirded and'palid, urged 
 him and menaced him with torture and with 
 death, if he did not speak the truth. Platina 
 seeing himself surrounded with soldiers, per- 
 turbed at the clamour of the by-standers, and 
 dreading that the Pope, through fear or through 
 rage, might adopt some violent means against 
 him, explained to His Holiness the grounds 
 upon which he, Platina, persuaded himself, that 
 so far from having machinated with Callimachus 
 against his person, such a thought had never 
 so much as entered his head. 
 
 Paul then, looking ascant at Platina, turned 
 
 to Vianesio his chamberlain, and said to him, 
 this man ought to be put to the torture, in 
 order that he may confess the truth, for he is 
 expert in conspiracies. For this pious work, 
 they conducted him to the castle of St. Angelo. 
 Already some of the suspected had died by
 
 66 tHE WITCH. 
 
 these tortures under the hand of the execu- 
 tioner. 
 
 This sepulchre of Adrian ( 50 ) appeared like 
 the bull of Phalaris ; ( 51 ) such were the groans 
 and the cries of miserable young people that 
 resounded through its dungeons. The execu- 
 tioners were already tired : but when the turn 
 came to Platina they girded themselves afresh 
 and prepared the instruments of his torture. He 
 was in a short time, stripped, scourged and 
 treated like a highwayman. During all this, 
 the chamberlain of the Pope was sitting in his 
 chair, not remembering what was prohibited 
 by the canons to individuals of the clergy. 
 When Platina was suspended in the air, and 
 in the greatest of his agony, this chamberlain 
 turned to a friend who was near him and 
 extending his hand to some jewellery on that 
 friend's person, asked him, what favourite lady 
 of his had been presenting him with that
 
 THE WITCH. 67 
 
 baiible. And having spoken of amours not 
 of the purest order, he turned to Platina and 
 tightened him up in still greater agony that he 
 might declare what steps he had taken in the 
 alleged conspiracy. Wearied at last ; get out, 
 said he, from the torture, to return to it in the 
 evenins;. In this second scene, at which the 
 
 O ' 
 
 archbishop Spalatense, assisted, instead of the 
 same torture he was threatened with an other 
 more rough on the following day if he did not 
 confess. 
 
 At that moment the pope's physician made 
 his appearance, announcing on the part of His 
 Holiness that he would give to Platina his 
 
 liberty. - When ? asked the wretched 
 
 man. Not very soon, answered the doctor, 
 for our most holy father must not be accused 
 of haste or of vindictiveness, which he might 
 be, if the public were to find that those arrested 
 with so much noise and put to the torhire, are
 
 68 THE WITCH. 
 
 to be immediately turned into the streets as 
 innocents. 
 
 That which most filled me with surprise 
 was, that the pope who a little before had 
 charged the criminals with conspiracy and 
 high treason, suddenly changed his opinion ; 
 for, this fable being divulged he then accused 
 them of heresy. In order that it might not 
 appear that this public arrest had taken place 
 without good foundation, this same pope, at 
 the expiration of ten months from the time at 
 which Platina was made prisoner, went to the 
 castle, and ordered him and others to be 
 brought before him, and they were then charged 
 with putting in doubt the immortality of the 
 soul, and with being, more than all besides, 
 lovers of the heathen gods. The pope then 
 took himself off', and Platina said to the go- 
 vernor : this accusation comes with an ill 
 grace from Paul II., because, here and every
 
 THE WITOH. 09 
 
 where, he orders the ancient statues to be dis- 
 interred and carried to the palace which he is 
 constructing beneath the capitol. The go- 
 vernor smiled and said : take care of that for 
 his funeral sermon. 
 
 It was not a bad thing that, which was said 
 of Paul IV., by a Spanish diplomatist, near 
 the house of the embassy. Finding himself 
 with three others of his own cloth, one of them 
 an Englishman and the other two Germans. 
 I being invisible sat myself down, quite at my 
 ease, on the crown of his hat, and thus I was 
 able to hear their curious conversation. They 
 could scarcely credit the wrongs and the judi- 
 cial excesses against the ministers and servants 
 of Philip II., which he was attributing to that 
 pope. They were counting on that security 
 which, by the divine right and that of the peo- 
 ple, is due to such ministers ; but they were 
 not calculating that the pope held his throne
 
 70 THE WITCH. 
 
 independent of all laws. After referring to 
 the assassination which he had prepared in 
 Bolognia by Jacomelo, Bishop of Belcastro, 
 for Vragas, the ambassador of that prince ; the 
 reigning pope continued he, actually has, at 
 the present time as prisoner, the Chevalier 
 Garcilaso de la Vega, envoy of the king to 
 the holy see for very important affairs. And 
 why has he made him prisoner? asked the 
 Englishman. Because, continued the Spaniard, 
 of certain letters which Garcilaso wrote to the 
 duke of Alba, notifying to him a few things 
 which he might justly and lawfully communi- 
 cate as a minister of the king. 
 
 The chief messenger, Juan Antonio de 
 Tarsis, he not only put in a dungeon, but even 
 ordered him to have a plentiful use of whip- 
 cord. In Bologina, he imprisoned the abbot 
 Briceiio, who was carrying to Don Juan Man- 
 rique, at Naples, some dispatches from the
 
 THE WITCH 71 
 
 Duke of Alba ; and at this time he continues 
 to hold that abbot a prisoner and to ill-treat 
 him. The ambassador, the Marquis of Sarria, 
 he treated badly and roughly, both by word 
 and deed, taking from him, by all means, 
 both his reputation and authority, and heaping 
 upon him many insults and wrongs. Other 
 faithful servants of the king he has also im- 
 prisoned and maltreated, holding up to disgrace 
 those who had been charged with a desire to 
 poison the Cardinal Carrafa ; the want of all 
 foundation for this calumny being at the same 
 time public and notorious. But in that, said 
 one of the Germans, the pope will proceed 
 with the sanction of the sacred college. Far 
 from that, answered the Spaniard, some cardi- 
 nals have entreated him that he would not thus 
 contemptously maltreat the ministers and de- 
 pendents of our monarch ; to whom his bless- 
 edness answered, that it was not treasures that 
 would immortalize his memory, but the states
 
 72 THE WITCH. 
 
 which the grandeur of his pontificate might 
 give to his family ; in virtue of which, he held 
 kings and emperors under his feet. I cannot 
 discover said the Englishman, why you should 
 think it strange that the ministers of your king 
 should be treated with contempt by a pope 
 who an in excess of forgetfulness and of fury 
 has pronounced our Queen illegitimate. 
 
 On arriving at this pitch I, involuntarily 
 began to sneeze violently. All of them were 
 dismayed, not seeing the mouth that discharged 
 the sternutation ; and -thus, without giving a 
 truce to reflection, they took to their heels and 
 scampered off, each in his own direction. 
 
 My guides translated me from hence to a 
 council of canons and theologians, convoked to 
 discuss, what the holy father should do, he 
 being menaced by a certain prince with losing 
 the ftopa boba de Ian reservnsJ^) They said
 
 THE WITCH. 73 
 
 things, which if published, would excite laugh- 
 ter. In this convocation the Cardinal de 
 Luca, Farinacio and Baronio were shuffling 
 about and making themselves busy. The pre- 
 sident prelate had an ardent desire to call The 
 decrees of Isidorus false : and a benedictine 
 monk, who, until then had been silent, said : 
 if you hold them to be false, how is it that you 
 suffer them to form the basis of your canonical 
 jurisprudence ? How is it, that, upon this 
 false foundation, is cast the collection of Gra- 
 ciano, authorised by the popes, and taught in 
 Bolognia, and in other schools of the catholic 
 church, as the principal code of its laws? 
 How is it, that these apocryphal monuments 
 were re-produced in the collections of Gre- 
 gory IX., of Boniface VIII., of Clement V., 
 and of John XXII ? Oh ! replied monsig- 
 nore : this would all go down very well if the 
 decrees of Isidorus had not in their favor a
 
 74 THE WITCH. 
 
 prescription of a thousand years. But, sir, 
 rejoined the benedictine : does prescription 
 tend to favor falsehood and imposture? And 
 can it be alleged that prescription gives value 
 to documents, against which, princes, entire 
 nations, bishops, and other sage and pious men, 
 have exclaimed for ages ? Why, at these very 
 decrees are levelled, the clamours against the 
 abuses and usurpations which this court pre- 
 tends are supported by them. A pretty pre- 
 scription is that, which pretends to authorise, 
 in the midst of protests from the offended 
 party, and against the cry of outraged rights 
 and despised and disobeyed canons. The 
 monk made a short pause, doubtless to see if 
 any one would answer him. But there reigned 
 throughout the council, a profound silence. It 
 is clear, he continued, that the actual ecclesi- 
 astical jurisprudence, by which this court 
 governs the metropolises and diocesses of
 
 THE WITCH. 75 
 
 Christendom, is impregnated with the grossest 
 fictions and that the system of her policy is 
 to carry forward the oppression of the 
 church, and not to permit to be re-esta- 
 blished in her the just liberty of which she is 
 worthy and which was left to her by Jesus 
 Christ as her inheritance. 
 
 On the good friar saying this, a small sup- 
 pressed murmur was heard ; it was exchanged 
 at once, for loud cries; they called him, 
 Janseniste, Vikeriste, Pistoyaniste. Does your 
 reverence wish, said the prelate that we may 
 believe the Datary ? or that the holy father 
 may lose one of the pearls of his tiara, which 
 are the apostolical reserves ? 
 
 Luckily the poor monk was able to dis- 
 entangle himself from the claws of these 
 eagles. I went out behind him but could not see 
 him : doubtless he hid himself where the shots
 
 76 THE WITCH. 
 
 of curialism, avarice, and ambition, could not 
 reach him. 
 
 This, in the cloisters ! said I to my col- 
 leagues. It makes me sick: let us go and see 
 the ostentation of this Babylon. .1 had scarcely 
 uttered this, when I found myself in the 
 Corso, And a sad spectacle it was, for me, 
 to witness that all the vices and all the deceits 
 which human wickedness can invent, were 
 bound up together in that city, called holy , 
 because it ought to be so. My soul, within 
 me, fell to my feet, when I observed that this 
 vast court, which of right, ought to count itself 
 to be to all Christendom the model of sincerity, 
 of probity of meekness of tolerance and of 
 disinterestedness; was on the contrary, the sink 
 of fraud of pride of duplicity of subtilty 
 of deceits of swindling and of cheatery . That 
 selling of olfices and benefices, of confirmation 
 of prelacies, of dispensations, and of spiritual
 
 THE WITCH. 77 
 
 graces, and that too with such an unblushing 
 face, would justify any one in calling her the 
 derision of the Christian faith ; so numerous are 
 the tricks invented by these ministers of the 
 church to filch out money from the pockets of 
 the people. 
 
 It so happened that I arrived just at the 
 time when the Pope had pawned certain 
 apostles, images, which were made of gold, and 
 having done so, he immediately increased the 
 tax upon his bulls, pro redemptione apostolo- 
 rum. ( 53 ) Although this was an act so unseemly, 
 and so prejudicial to the decorum of the pon- 
 tifical dignity, it was done without the least 
 appearance of shame. I said : is it possible 
 that there is a soul of God, who, seeing this 
 accumulation of disorders, has not the heart 
 to reprehend and cry out against them in order 
 that they may be reformed ?
 
 78 THE WITCH. 
 
 Alas, sir, said an old abbot : so many and 
 so respectable are those who do this, that 
 of their lamentations one might write volumes. 
 For instance : there is St. Barnard, St. 
 Peter Damino,( 54 ) the Bishop Alvaro Pela- 
 gio, the Cardinals Zabarel, ( 55 ) and de 
 Cusa,( 56 ) the chancellor Gerson,( 57 ) Theodo- 
 rico de Niem, Nicholas Clemangis, (^ and 
 numerous other men, who fill the world with 
 these complaints. Did I say men ? entire 
 kingdoms have raised their voice against 
 this court, bewailing its oppression and the 
 artifices by which their blood has been drained 
 off, and their bowels torn out, so that they have 
 almost been left to ask an alms. But if we did 
 not give the ear of the merchant to such cries, 
 we all of us, with the pope at our head, should 
 ere this have become inmates of the workhouse 
 "or of the hospitals. How is this? said I. Be- 
 cause all the people of Europe answered he,
 
 THE WITCH. 79 
 
 give themselves up to us to be squeezed and plun- 
 dered, and yet all of them are asking for those 
 fish-hooks of lead, ( 59 ) with which we bring to 
 Rome a great part of the gold and silver of all 
 the world. And why do you not remedy that ? 
 said I. Because, said he, Luther mixed him- 
 self up with them ; and this friar not only 
 spake badly of the sale of our indulgences and 
 of other stratagems to make the nations our 
 tributaries, but also blasphemed God by the 
 heresies he taught in Bohemia. You say 
 what is true, said I : but if you had re- 
 formed yourselves, as you ought to have done, 
 and not have irritated him with your ex- 
 communications ; and if to the submissive 
 letters which he wrote you at the beginning, you 
 had answered with paternal charity, in order 
 to draw him back to the good way, or to pre- 
 serve him in it ; peradventure, he would not 
 have precipitated himself into errors, nor would 
 Germany have experienced those spiritual and
 
 80 THE WITCH. 
 
 temporal disasters in which that country was 
 afterwards involved. The old abbot shrugged 
 up his shoulders and turned his back upon 
 me. 
 
 I continued for a while observing the osten- 
 tation of that court, the haughtiness of the 
 cardinals, the multitude of domestic prelates, 
 of prothonotaries, chamberlains, auditors, some 
 of the chamber, and others of the court ; 
 secretaries, abbreviators, advocates, attornies, 
 and other kinds of officers. On beholding so 
 much luxury, so many travelling equipages, so 
 much ostentation, and which might even excite 
 surprise in the Ottoman Porte, I exclaimed : 
 and is this the head of Christianity ? Is this 
 the apostolical court? Who shall trace out 
 from what here presents itself to the view of 
 open day, that humility and non-conformity 
 to terrestial things, which shone out so re- 
 splendently, in Christ and in his apostles ?
 
 THE WITCH. 81 
 
 I did not say this in so low a tone, but that 
 I was heard by two strangers who were near 
 me, and it happened that they were the Jesuits 
 Palavicini, ( 60 ) and Lainez. ( 61 ) I felt myself 
 a little chilled when my colleagues announced 
 them to me ; however I threw my fears to 
 the wind, for, what I had said, I had 
 said. I know not how they came to get 
 scent that I belonged to their order, but they 
 treated me with fraternal meekness, and not 
 with courtly ire. 
 
 I have heard thy lamentations^ brother, said 
 Pajacivini, and I attribute them to ignorance. 
 " Rome is not the court of Romans who are 
 " inhabitants in her by descent : she is the court 
 " of ecclesiastics, congregated spontaneously 
 " from the whole Christian world, and who, but a 
 " blockhead or a malignant fellow, will deny 
 " that as a stimulus to virtue there ought to
 
 82 THE WITCH. . 
 
 " be a universal court of all Christians, in which 
 " every one may be able, by the ladder of 
 " merit, to aspire to the highest summits of 
 " dignity, of riches, and of dominion ?" I know 
 well enough that some rigourists censure " ex- 
 " cess in the ecclesiastical revenues, which are 
 " here accumulated, sometimes in one and the 
 " same person in opposition to the rules of dis- 
 " tributive justice." But they do not take into 
 consideration that " these same excesses are con - 
 " verted into benefits to innumerable other per- 
 " sons; for, the stimulus of conscience and that of 
 " reputation move the rich prelates to works of 
 " the most striking piety which they cede in the 
 " greatest honour to God, the alleviation of the 
 " poor, the maintenance of Operarios, ( 62 ) and 
 " the ornament of the ecclesiastical court * * * ; 
 " and this is verified, even supposing that the 
 " provision of the benefices are disproportinate 
 " and that they do not make residence obli- 
 " gatory"
 
 THE WITCH. 83 
 
 This was said by Palacivini, in so loud a 
 tone, that it excited the attention of those who 
 were passing through the Corso, some of whom 
 were apparently listening to him. He said 
 that he should have the greatest pleasure if 
 the whole catholic world were listening to him 
 in order to its being undeceived. 
 
 Father Lainez then taking the word, said : 
 you know very well, friends, that I came to 
 Rome, called by Paul IV. whose intimate 
 aulic and consulter was my chum at college, 
 I mean Father Salmeron; and that his 
 deference to my counsels was inherited by 
 Pius IV. the successor of that pope. You 
 cannot be ignorant either, of the part which I 
 took in the council of Trent, as a theologian 
 of the holy see ; nor of that which I said in 
 it, in order to vindicate this court from the as- 
 persions of certain malevolent people, who, from 
 its opulence and ostentation, infer that Rome
 
 84 THE WITCH. 
 
 has degenerated from that which it was, and 
 that if the head of St. Peter could now make 
 its appearance he would not be able to recog- 
 nize it. These censurers ought to know that 
 " the holy see may be recognized in two ways ; 
 " according to the spirit, and according to the 
 "flesh : that is : as a wall of charity and re- 
 ligion, and as the fountain of temporal 
 " utilities. Both one and the other of these 
 " two qualities she ought to maintain in order 
 " to conserve herself in esteem, even among 
 " the imperfect, inasmuch as the second, helps 
 " and disposes to the exercise of the first" 
 
 On saying this, the famous ultra-inontano, 
 Andres Victorelo, ungirded himself amidst 
 the grand concourse, and applauding the zeal 
 of the good fathers, he said " by the divine 
 " counsel, shined, and still shines, in magnifi- 
 " cence and splendour, the church of Rome. 
 " This was announced by the oracle of a
 
 THE WITCH. 85 
 
 " prophet : kings shall be those that feed thee ; 
 " and queens shall be thy nurses * * * *. 
 11 Thou shall suck tJiemilk of the nations, and 
 " shall be suckled at the breasts of kings." 
 And, being turned to the spectators, he said 
 in latin, doubtless that foreigners might under- 
 stand him: Desinant Jiceretici OPES romanis 
 pontiftcibus vitio vertere. ( 63 ). 
 
 Pardon me, sir, I then said : that which 
 tradition understands of the augmentation of 
 the spiritual glory of the church, it is a great 
 error to apply, as you apply it, to the tempo- 
 ral splendour and to the haughtiness and riches 
 of the court of Rome. We are completely 
 dished ! [buenos estamos] said Palavicini ; well, 
 but who will provide sustenance for all those 
 who surround the pontifical throne ? " Every 
 " parish provides for its curate ; every diocease 
 " for its bishop, every town for its lord, every
 
 80 THE WITCH. 
 
 " state for its prince * * * * Nor is it any crime 
 " that the money of one country may go to 
 " another, so that in exchange for this money 
 " may be brought the most necessary and most 
 " precious merchandize, which is the law and 
 " conservation of justice. How can it be said 
 " to be extortion if the court of the ecclesasti- 
 " cal principality be nourished with the con- 
 " tributions of Christendom ?" Don't you see, 
 brothers, said an ecclesiastic, turning to the 
 multitude, that which I was saying two cen- 
 turies ago, that Rome with her private reserves 
 and with her incessant and enormous exactions, 
 has reduced the church to a deplorable situa- 
 tion pro sustinendo statwn curicv et capitis ? 
 ( 64 ). I asked my interpreters who this clergy- 
 man was, and they told me : Gerson. 
 
 But, he who most tickled my fancy was the 
 Bishop of Cordova don Domingo Pimentel,
 
 THE WITCH. 87 
 
 who, coming into the centre of the crowd said, 
 " An extraordinary thing it is, to pretend that 
 " the head of the church may sustain himself 
 " by the granting dispensations, with or with- 
 " out cause for money in the public market." 
 Do you ask who shall provide aliments for 
 the pope and for his court ? I answer that, 
 " the temporal state, which the pope possesses, 
 " is greater than that of five potentates * * * * 
 " and that those are guilty of an offence against 
 " the power of his holiness, who say that his 
 ' ( sustenance depends upon the Datary, he 
 " having in addition to the temporal rents of 
 " five potentates, so many others of an eccle- 
 " siastical kind, to provide for himself and 
 " for all those who pertain to the court." 
 
 Doubtless you have not seen, said a french- 
 man, that which has just been written by a 
 professor of one of our seminaries, it is this :
 
 88 THE WITCH. 
 
 that the clergy ought to have riches and honors 
 in no small measure. I have not seen 
 it, said I, but I am certain that if Jesus 
 Christ were to enter into some of the 
 churches and vestries of Christendom, he 
 would overthrow the tables which avarice has 
 set up within them. On hearing this, he 
 turned about and mixed himself among the 
 crowd. 
 
 Tell me, reverend fathers, said an old 
 Piedmontese : how can such a court be worthy 
 the head of the church? a court which, 
 according to your own confession commits 
 such lamentable abuses; which sanctifies 
 maxims subversive of evangelical morality ; 
 which authorizes an unjust policy, that, 
 as Polybius ( 65 ) says, is the root of wicked- 
 nesses and crimes ; which holds it to be in 
 conformity with the spirit of religion to aspire
 
 THE WITCH. 89 
 
 to the summits of dignity of empire and of 
 riches ? 
 
 Lainez wished to explain to him, the influ- 
 ence of the temporal utilities in the progress of 
 religion, and the mode how, in Rome, the 
 flesh helps and disposes the spirit. The old 
 man was full of anger, and cut short with him, 
 saying : father, father, don't you know what 
 the Saviour said: the flesh availeth nothing, 
 the spirit is that which giveth life ? and St. 
 Paul : Our arms are not of the flesh ! This 
 doctrine of yours, that " the universal court of 
 " the church may regard herself according to 
 " the flesh, and that she ought to maintain 
 " to herself, this token of identity because the 
 " flesh helpeth and disposeth to the exercise of 
 " the spirit" has another support and not that of 
 Jesus Christ and his apostles. A carnal court, 
 a court where the exercise of religion is sup- 
 posed to be helped by the temporal utilities, can-
 
 90 THE WITCH. 
 
 not correspond to the church which the apostles 
 call the body of Christ, but to that which 
 other members of your company have forged 
 out, that is, to a body purely political, 
 governed by human power which, it pretends, 
 God has communicated to the pope as his 
 vicar. 
 
 But do you deny, interrupted Palavicini, 
 that this universal court remunerates a great 
 number of learned and worthy men ? If you 
 allude, answered the old man, to all the provision 
 of bishoprics, and prelacies, and dignities of 
 the church which the pope arrogates to himself, 
 I, who am an old man, remember to have 
 heard Nicholas Clemangis say, speaking 
 of his time, " of those who ascend in our day 
 " to the summit of the pontificate, there are 
 " some who have not even glanced over, much 
 " less heard, or learned, the sacred scriptures ; 
 " and who have only touched the surface,
 
 THE WITCH. 91 
 
 " although they swear to comprehend them, at 
 " the time of their consecration." 
 
 You say, that here, learned and worthy men 
 are remunerated : now Clemangis says, that 
 " unlearned and illiterate men are promoted 
 " to the episcopal dignity." Here then, is the 
 sense in which this court is carnal. Because 
 " these promoted ones" says Clemangis, " as- 
 " pire to the gain, not of the souls, but of tfie 
 " purses. This is the profit that in every thing 
 " they seek for, and which they are anxious to 
 " procure: this is with them, piety; and nothing 
 " occupies their thoughts but that which may 
 " conduce to the increase of their treasure." 
 And you, father Lainez, who assisted in the 
 council of Trent, did you not hear the ambas- 
 sador of Philip II., Don Martin of Gaztelu, 
 bewailing the ignorance and the immorality, 
 of the bishops which the pope had sent there? 
 I was not, as you are, his coutryman, much less 
 L2
 
 92 THE WITCH. 
 
 his confidant, and notwithstanding, he shewed 
 me a letter in which he said to his sovereign : 
 " the worst appointments of all, made by His 
 " Holiness are those of the bishops ; because 
 " they are young men of little experience, 
 " unlettered, unexemplary and without habits 
 " of retirement from the world, which qualities 
 " ought to be held indispensible, and there- 
 " fore, in the absence of these, evil conse- 
 " quences are only to be expected." 
 
 Disgusted, and even surprised at the cool- 
 ness with which these truths were heard I 
 turned the corner, and wheeling round by 
 another street, I ran against a large edifice. 
 What house is that ? said I to an old abbot. 
 It is, said he, the brothel established by Pope 
 Sixtus IV. And what may your name be, 
 sir? I rejoined. Cornelius Agrippa,( 66 ) he 
 replied, and continued : " every week each 
 " prostitute pays to the Pope a julio ; ( 67 )
 
 THE WITCH. 93 
 
 " a tax which in some years exceeds twenty 
 " thousand ducats." ( 68 ) And does the ponti- 
 fical government really take this money ? said 
 I. "" Not only does it take it," said he, "but 
 " the heads of the church sum up the product 
 " of these brothels in their accounts and add 
 " them up together with the ecclesiastical 
 " revenue." And pray sir, said I, how do 
 you know this ? I know it of myself, answered 
 he, " I once heard them cast up these accounts : 
 " that one has two benefices ; that is to say : 
 " the one is a curacy of twenty crowns of gold, 
 " and the other is a priory of forty crowns and 
 " three prostitutes in the brothel." 
 
 This scandal appeared to me incredible, 
 until being called aside by one of the nine 
 prelates who had exposed to Paul III, the 
 disorders of his court, this prelate said to me : 
 what hast thou come to Rome for ? Surely, if 
 thou hadst no errand in coming here, thou wilt
 
 94 THE WITCH. 
 
 have one in returning by the same road. " In 
 " this city the prostitutes are walking about 
 " the streets like matrons, or ride on mules, 
 ' and are followed, in open day, by the 
 " noble attendants of cardinals and by the 
 " clergy. In no city thou wilt see, nor have 
 " we, ourselves, seen, corruption arrive at such 
 " a pitch, for these creatures even inhabit 
 " magnificent palaces." 
 
 That prelate left me, and on going forward, 
 the Jesuit Masdeu who was a great friend of 
 my family, cut short upon me and said : with 
 my advice thou shouldst not have travelled so 
 far. Dost thou expect to find here, the Jerusalem 
 of the saints ? Through God's mercy, there 
 are not wanting in Rome, just men who do not 
 bend the knee to the idols of the flesh, of avarice 
 and of ambition which are worshipped in her; 
 but this "capital of Christendom has made 
 " herself, by her customs, the kingdom of con-
 
 THE WITCH. 95 
 
 " cupiscence, the seat of unclean pleasures, 
 
 " the country of prostitutes, * * * * The 
 
 " ministers of the sanctuary frisk about in the 
 " layers of dishonor : the rods of her justice 
 " are warped to the empire of fornication : 
 " the keys of her treasures and of her graces 
 
 " are in the hands of adulterers : the infa- 
 
 " mous pimps [alca/iuetes] ( 69 ) are the con- 
 " fidantes of her prelates and of her principal 
 " ecclesiastics, * * * * " 
 
 He was adding to this a picture of 
 colours so dark, that, already, I was sinking 
 for want of breath. I was, therefore, obliged 
 to ask my guides to take me out of that 
 Babylon. 
 
 Curiosity detained me to know what stench 
 it was, that came out by the doors and win- 
 dows of a great house which was on my left 
 hand. This is the Datary,( 70 ) answered one of
 
 06 THE WITCH. 
 
 my companions : the smell comes from the 
 money which is paid to it for bulls and for 
 dispensations and apostolical graces. 
 
 And shall not we see the Pope, said I, 
 giving with great pomp the benediction to the 
 people? All in a sudden I found myself 
 before the palace and saw Paul II. with his 
 rich tiara which cost five thousand marks of 
 silver. ( 71 ) Whilst he was bestowing the bene- 
 diction, a mason near to me said : this is all 
 very good, but we want tickets in order that 
 they may give us some rolls at the bakehouses. 
 This act being concluded, I was taken to 
 witness the publication of plenary indulgences 
 granted by Alexander VI., in order to mani- 
 fest the joy which he felt on receiving the news 
 that the zealous dominican Savonarola, ( 72 ) had 
 been burnt in Florence. 
 
 I was struck with surprise, at the public cere-
 
 THE WITCH. 97 
 
 mony of the cardinals kissing the hand of the 
 Pope, and the bishops his knee. One of the 
 courtiers perceiving the surprise which this in- 
 equality of favours produced upon me, told me, 
 that Benedict XIII, instigated by the bishops, 
 was pleased to concede to them the privilege 
 of kissing the hand ; but that the cardinals 
 would not consent to be equalled in this, by the 
 successors of the apostles. 
 
 In the Sistina chapel I noticed that at the 
 sides of the throne, there were two lions sup- 
 porting the arms of the Pope in their claws. 
 I observed to the cicerone who was going 
 about with us shewing the palace : lions here ? 
 these arms would better be sustained by sheep. 
 He smiled, but did not condescend to answer 
 me. In the lavation of holy Thursday, I 
 noticed that the Pope used to kiss the feet of 
 the apostles, but he did not set himself down 
 at table with them. Neither in one nor the
 
 98 THE WITCH. 
 
 other, said I, does His Holiness follow the 
 example of Jesus Christ. 
 
 I was not at all edified by the multitude of 
 eunuchs who with an effeminate and sensual 
 music, in the office of the holy week, and in 
 presence of the Pope chaunted the penitential 
 psalm, {Miserere mei, Dem. ( 73 ) 
 
 They took me from thence to the soiree of 
 a monsignore, where, after the refreshments had 
 been served up and concluded, a contention 
 arose on the subject of Clement VIII., who 
 in correcting the edition of the Vulgate made 
 by Sixtus V, with nearly two thousand varia- 
 tions, had incurred, thereby, the greatest ex- 
 communion fulminated by this Pope against 
 those who might publish any other bible with- 
 out taking his for the model. They then 
 treated of the reforms made in the Roman 
 Breviary, no one spoke of the necessity of
 
 THE WITCH. 99 
 
 purging it from the fables inserted in it at the ex- 
 pence of the impostor Isidorus. It was therein 
 held as an incontrovertible doctrine, that it is the 
 exclusive right of the Pope, to ordain to the ec- 
 clesiastical office. They treated me as a Janse- 
 nist, because I intimated to them, touching this 
 point, the indisputable authority of the bishops. 
 
 I asked an abbot, what sort of birds the 
 ciceroni were, and he answered me, that this 
 was one of the most lucrative branches of that 
 court : that some of them are like greyhounds, 
 who go in chase of strangers in order to suck 
 them of their quattrini: ( 74 ) that they are 
 accustomed to share their profits with the 
 stewards or keepers of the palaces, whose 
 galleries of pictures or cabinets, or museums 
 they allow to be shown to the amateurs ; and 
 that the stewards are accustomed to have an 
 understanding with their masters. He related 
 to me, in proof of this, that a certain cardinal
 
 100 THE WITCH. 
 
 exacted from his valet de chambre the half of 
 the gratuities of those who went to see his 
 immense collection of pictures ; which domestic 
 was so little of a dissembler that, to every one 
 who did not give a good round present, he 
 used to say : little of this will find its way to 
 me if you do not open your purse wider. 
 
 Whilst the Abbot was diverting me with this 
 joke ; a learned barrister was endeavouring to 
 undeceive another foreigner, who had shewn a 
 desire to see, on the following day, the Holy 
 face or Feromca.( }f> ) He told him that as to 
 the supposed meeting of Veronica with the 
 Saviour in the street of Amargura, there was 
 now scarcely a prudent man that did not take it 
 for a fable. He declaimed, with the same 
 motive, against the multitude of those pieces of 
 linen which are venerated in the Christian 
 Churches of various towns, saying, they were 
 the inventions of false piety which disordered
 
 THE WITCH. 101 
 
 religion. In a certain church, said he, is shewn 
 a rib of St. Saviour. Was there, perchance, 
 another Saviour besides Jesus Christ? Or 
 did Jesus Christ on his ascending into heaven 
 leave a rib behind him? Here we have the 
 prepuce of the Saviour and there is another in 
 Spain. Is not this making a mockery of the 
 sacred and dignified person of Jesus Christ? 
 John the Baptist had but one head, and yet 
 they venerate two; one here and another at 
 Amiens; and perhaps there will be another 
 among the ashes of the holy forerunner which are 
 preserved in the metropolitan church of Geneva. 
 Of St. Ann also are venerated, two heads; one 
 in Lyons and the other in Dura, a city in Ger- 
 many. As to Apostles, if we wish to count 
 them, we should find more than twenty-four, 
 although there were but twelve ; and of these 
 twelve, one cannot be found, another is in the 
 Indies, and another no one has ever seen nor 
 is it wished that he may be seen. Of the
 
 102 THE WITCH. 
 
 three nails which Eusebius says, were driven 
 into our Saviour on the cross, one, St. Hellen 
 threw into the Adriatic sea, to calm a tempest ; 
 another, she caused to be put in the helmet of 
 her son Constantine ; and of the third, she 
 ordered to be made a bit for the bridle 
 of his horse. And now there is one 
 here j others at Milan, at Cologne, at Paris, at 
 Lyons, and perhaps in other places. Of the 
 fragments of the holy cross, if all which are 
 venerated in Christendom as cut off from that 
 which we have in Rome were to be brought 
 together, several waggons might be loaded with 
 them. Teeth, which the Saviour shed when 
 he was a boy, of even those shown in France 
 the number exceeds five hundred. Of the 
 milk of our Lord's mother ! who knows how 
 much of it is exhibited in the world ; a thing, 
 not only improbable, but one to which it would 
 be alien to decency to give the name which it 
 deserves. In Aguisgran, there are I know not
 
 THE WITCH. 103 
 
 what sort of old breeches which it is said have 
 been worn by St. Joseph, and the people go to 
 see them as if they were things from heaven. 
 Of the hair of the Magdalen, might be made 
 many wigs : with the teeth of St. Apologne 
 might be filled many sacks. The grinders of 
 St. Christopher are without number : there 
 are some among them with such prongs as 
 would correspond to a head two yards in 
 diameter. To say nothing of the very earth 
 on which the angel stood when he appeared 
 to the shepherds, of the feathers of the wing 
 of the archangel Gabriel, of the breath of 
 the ox and of the mule in the holy crib, of the 
 tail of the ass on which Christ rode on Palm 
 Sunday, of the waistcoat of the Trinity, and 
 of other things which if they are not forgeries 
 by the impious, are the effects of stupid igno- 
 rance and blind superstition. 
 
 With open mouth was I listening to this-
 
 104 THE WITCH. 
 
 good jurist, when I heard a great tumult in 
 the street. Out I ran, and saw the court 
 crowded by the French clergy in the 'act of 
 making propositions, and Anthony Amauld ( 7G ) 
 flying from the red cap which was offered to 
 him on condition that he should oppose these 
 propositions. But to catch this red cap went 
 Tirso Gonzalez, the general of the Jesuits, 
 Rocaberti (") and the Benedictines Sfondrati 
 and Aguirre : ( 78 ) the latter was carrying the 
 jewel. 
 
 This fete was crowned by six carts loaded 
 with the books of those ultra-montanes, which 
 books a maker of fire-works had just bought 
 as waste paper for the purpose of making 
 rockets. 
 
 This farce had not well passed, when a group 
 of highwaymen and banditti presented itself 
 to me on one side, and the pontifical governor
 
 THE WITCH. 105 
 
 on the other ; he was making a solemn treaty 
 which put them under the judical protection 
 against all their crimes. I could not conceal 
 my surprise at this policy, unknown as I sup- 
 posed to civilized nations ; one of the thieves 
 said to me : wait a moment and thou wilt see 
 us provided with public situations. The pity 
 only is, that two cousins of mine who are 
 brothers and go about, with others of their 
 class, plundering in the forests are not here ; 
 but indeed, although far away in the moun- 
 tains, they are quite secure for nobody will 
 prosecute them. 
 
 I walked to the end of the street, and in 
 traversing a square, I saw given to a coffee- 
 house keeper, twenty-five lashes on the 
 shoulders with a vergajo, for having served an 
 Englishman with fresh eggs and milk in order 
 to break his fast one day in Lent. I drew near 
 to the sufferer and asked one of the spectators 
 
 M
 
 THE WITCIf. 
 
 what was his crime ; lie told me, adding that 
 this justice was administered by virtue of an 
 edict of the vicar general, the cardinal Anibal 
 de la Genga. I was contending that it was 
 impossible, when he drew out from his pocket 
 the printed edict, and made me read it ; it 
 was dated 3rd March, 1821. Then is not 
 this cardinal, said I, the reigning Pope ? The 
 same, Leo XII, he answered. And is this r 
 continued I, the government which leaves the 
 wicked unpunished ? 
 
 I turned about without waiting for the an- 
 swer and fixed my eyes upon a superb edifice 
 dyed with blood, and covered with warlike in- 
 struments, and over the door was this inscrip- 
 tion : THE FABRIC OF CRUSADES. At the 
 
 door I found Nicolas Gurtler,( 79 ) the historian 
 of the Templars, who calling me aside, said to 
 me : the first foundations of this building were 
 laid by Urban II. in order to weaken the
 
 THE WITCH. 107 
 
 power of kings, who were shewing front against 
 his temporal dominion. I entered the interior, 
 and examining its departments, I read the fol- 
 lowing : Crusade of Hungary and Bohemia 
 against the Tartars. Crusade in favor of the 
 Teutonic Knights against the Pagans of Livo- 
 nia, of Prussia and of Courland. I asked 
 the porter of this department what offence 
 those idolaters had given to the Teutonic 
 Knights? None at all, answered he; only 
 these Knights desired to subjugate them, 
 and place themselves in authority over their 
 country. Another inscription, said : Crusade 
 of England against the Barons whom Henry 
 III. was not able to bring into subjection. 
 Another : Crusade in France and in Italy 
 in order to rid the house of Swabia of the 
 kingdom of Naples and Sicily. Further on 
 was the Crusade which Urban VI. published 
 in England against France. Then that of 
 Martin IF. against Peter HI. of Arragon, 
 
 M2
 
 108 
 
 THE WITCFf. 
 
 declaring him dethroned, and gicin.g his king- 
 dom to Charles of Falois. At the foot, in a 
 note,, were borne in memory those who went 
 in this crusade provided with stones, and 
 who on throwing them said : there goes a 
 stone against Don Pedro of Arragon, in order 
 to gain indulgences. 
 
 I thought, said I to the porter of that build- 
 ing, that crusades established and preached 
 by the Court of Rome were only directed 
 to recover the holy land of Palestine. 
 This was in illo tempore() he answerered : 
 and thereupon the apostolical munificence 
 greatly extended itself. There are Crusades 
 against Crusades : the cross of Christ gives a 
 colouring to the political plans of this court 
 or of her devotees: indulgences are distri- 
 buted with full hands, not less to those who 
 fight against Christians than those who fight 
 against idolaters ; provided that this war may
 
 WITCH. 109 
 
 conform itself to the interests of the church. 
 To those of the court you mean to say, answered 
 I, because the church has no interests in war 
 of any kind, nor in any thing in which her 
 
 cause is to be promoted by the spilling of 
 blood. 
 
 An abbot was strolling about in this place, 
 and on hearing my last words, turning to me 
 
 with great freedom : what ? knowest thou 
 
 not, said he, that there are wars of religion ? 
 The only thing that I know, said I, is, 
 that it ought not to have them, and that this 
 offensive title of the church, has been the 
 means of introducing to it the angry passions. 
 Thou must be as black as the people of An- 
 gola, replied the abbot. Tell me the truth, 
 brother ; I then said to him with great compo- 
 sure : are not these titles of blacks and whites 
 presents which you have made to us ? is pon- 
 tifical crusade that of our army of the faith?
 
 110 THE WITCH. 
 
 has the apostolical assembly founded itself 
 here ? Ministers of Justice ! Ministers of 
 Justice ! he cried out most lustily : take this 
 Jacobin off' to the Inquisition. A swarm of these 
 beings sallied forth from those caverns and 
 came up to take me ; but they remained like 
 petrified statues when they found that I had 
 only left them my shadow. 
 
 I next found myself in the garb of a pilgrim, 
 with my staff and my calabash, at the foot of 
 the column which is placed in the front of St. 
 Mary the Great, and which was taken from the 
 the ruins of the Temple of Peace in the Campo 
 Vazcino. There was near it a knot of half- 
 witted diplomatists disputing on legitimacy. 
 So far did they bewilder themselves on the sub- 
 ject of the support which the despotic kings 
 derived from the court of Rome, that I was 
 twice tempted, as vulgar people say, to let 
 loose my monkey upon them. In order to
 
 THE WITCH. 
 
 Ill 
 
 dissimulate my espionage, I had fixed my eyes 
 on the image of the Virgin which is above the 
 column. This wandering pilgrim, said one of 
 them between his teeth, seems to be a booby : 
 for all the world I dare say he is a Spaniard. 
 And a manchego, rejoined I, and I have even 
 ^belonging to my family some of those who 
 knew the grandchildren of Sancho Panza. 
 My pleasantry seemed to tickle their fancy, and 
 placing myself in their circle, what thinkest 
 thou of legitimacy ? said one of them to me. 
 
 The contrary of what this court thinks, re- 
 replied I. They all stared at me like appari- 
 tions. And dost thou know, said another, 
 what this court thinks ? Have you not, said I, 
 prohibited the letters of Pope Hildebrand? 
 And how could we prohibit, answered he, the 
 works of a canonized Pope, to whom Rome 
 owes her temporal power all over the world ? 
 And do you govern by these works then ? said I.
 
 112 THE WITCH. 
 
 What rule of policy is more certain ? said hev 
 Then, rejoined I, according to the policy of tin* 
 Pope, legitimacy of kings does not come from 
 God nor yet from the people, but from the devil/ 
 because he says of them, tlrat " the devil, insti- 
 " gating them with blind covetousness and with 
 " intolerable temerity, they dare to lord them- 
 " selves over their equals." All of them 
 were silent and I proceeded : you say that you 
 follow the rule of policy of Hildebrand. 
 Hildebrand says, that by instigation of the 
 devil kings domineer over their subjects : well 
 then, it follows that the legitimacy which this 
 court acknowledges in princes must come from 
 the infernal regions. 
 
 You are, cried all of them with one voice, 
 an enemy of the apostolical chair. The coun- 
 cil of Trent taught me, said I with much 
 carelessness, who those are that you are wont 
 to call enemies. Let us take him off' at once,
 
 THE WITCH. 113 
 
 said they, to the most holy father. This threat 
 gave me not the least concern, because I knew 
 that the Pope, as well as I, was a Jesuit of the 
 short cassock ; and that in shewing him my 
 scapulary, which is the 'countersign of our 
 congregation, we should immediately be 
 friends. But yet, said I within myself, who 
 knows what effect anger may be able to pro- 
 duce in this new world ? And so, when they 
 were on the point of seizing me with their 
 hands, I once more became invisible. I 
 laughed to see them trembling as if they had 
 been dipped in quicksilver. From fright, two 
 of them fell neck over heels up to their 
 shoulders into a mud-sink ; and were totally 
 immersed in the filth ; another went off in a fit. 
 One said : it is the devil. Another, no it is 
 an angel : and there ought to be a myriad of 
 these in Rome to publish the truth, in order 
 that we may not be lost through those flattering 
 decretalists and probabilities, [probabilitistas.]
 
 114 THE WITCH. 
 
 About this time I saw a multitude of bishops 
 and theologians coming out from the temple 
 and running towards Monte Cavallo. Don 
 Francisco de Vargas the ambassador of the 
 council of Trent was in their rear. He ap- 
 proached the circle, and saluted, by name, the 
 person who was speaking, calling him friend. 
 For what purpose do these come to Rome ? 
 said the abbot to Vargas. They voted, an- 
 swered Vargas, that the residence of the 
 bishops was of divine right, and it has brought 
 on some of them such fear, and on others such 
 ambition of red caps that they come to retract 
 their votes. Don't you see, said the abbot, 
 turning to the rest, how true it is wliat I have 
 told you ? And to Vargas : this moment, there 
 has just disappeared from us a spectre in the 
 garb of a pilgrim, who has thrown in our face, 
 with good reason, our attachment to the 
 maxims of Hildebrand. I tell you that he is 
 sent from God in order that we may open our
 
 THE WITCH. 115 
 
 eyes and be converted. The bailey stems, said 
 Vargas, are now hard to make shrill-pipes of. 
 In yonder council we have heard a whole batch 
 of these " ingenious Silvesters, deceivers and 
 " perpetual flatterers of the Pope ; who appear 
 <f to have no soul nor any end in view but 
 " their own interests. But so goes the world, 
 " and the worship of God falls to the ground." 
 
 That is not the worst, said the abbot, for 
 here the hopes and fears of the fathers and 
 theologians of the council are fomented : and 
 none of them would either hope or fear, if they 
 had not in prospect either promises or me- 
 naces. 
 
 I was tempted again to present myself in the 
 midst of the assembly to tell them what I had 
 read on the subject in the memoirs of tlie 
 Bishops Ayala and Gonzalez de Mendoza. 
 But said I, Anthony, take care of thy skin,
 
 116 THE WITCH. 
 
 lest in the midst of them thou art abandoned 
 by the witch and givest thy bones to the 
 dungeons of the inquisition. Vargas however, 
 I perceived, was saying enough of that which 
 I was in a fidget to add ; therefore I did not 
 interrupt him and he continued : look, my 
 friends, and just tell me " if the church shapes 
 " herself out in this era, for reformation, the 
 " want of which is the cause of so many evils 
 " and heresies, and the loss of so many king- 
 " doms and provinces. A sad thing it is that 
 *' she does not attend to the true remedy ob 
 " solam dominandi libidinem, ( 81 ) for it appears 
 " that some people only wish that all should 
 " finish with themselves." 
 
 Preach, preach, said I within myself, that 
 Pius VII. may come forth bewailing himself 
 for having fallen on calamitous times, and times 
 of great humiliation for the spouse of Jesus 
 Christ, in which it is not possible for the Pope
 
 THE WITCH. 117 
 
 to practise and in which he has not means of 
 renovating the holy maxims of the dethroning 
 of kings. But what shall come to pass, when 
 calamitous times cease, and those of prospe- 
 rity return? When that may be possible 
 which to day is impossible ? when shall those 
 means be at hand which for the present have 
 disappeared ? 
 
 I left them entangled in this useless conver- 
 sation, because I was alarmed at the sound of 
 a trumpet. The echo took me to a sort of 
 market or fair, in which there went about a 
 number of abbots distributing a great multi- 
 tude of briefs, at the same time that a common 
 crier was announcing to all Christians urbis et 
 orbis, ( 82 ) that they might avail themselves of 
 matrimonial dispensations with cause or with- 
 out cause. He said that those who might allege 
 cause, would be despatched for less money ; 
 and those who might not must make up for this
 
 118 THE WITCH. 
 
 want by an augmentation in the price. For 
 dispensations of the second class, were asked 
 of one, fifteen hundred ducats ; and of another 
 six thousand ; in some cases the price rose up 
 to even fourteen thousand; all of standard 
 silver delivered in Rome. 
 
 I approached a friar, who was listening to the 
 announcement and was observing this commerce; 
 I said to him : father, has not the council of 
 Trent ordered, that dispensations should always 
 be with cause, and gratis 2 He looked at me 
 with an evil eye and answered : and does not 
 the bachelor know that the Pope is superior 
 to the council ? 
 
 Near to a table full of labelled packages 
 were two persons disputing and driving 
 a bargain with an abbot who was provided 
 with a writing desk. Are they pears? I 
 asked one of them. It is the fruit of another
 
 THE WITCH. 1 19' 
 
 tree, lie answered me : they are two dispensa- 
 tions, one by which an illegitimate son may be 
 ordained, and the other by which a canon may 
 preserve three fat livings. This drew me up 
 close to the party and I heard the abbot say 
 to them : thou art dispatched : but the peti- 
 tions will not be sent up to the registry, until 
 you shall have redeemed them by payment of 
 the tax. The same thing he said to a labourer, 
 who had come to know if a jubilee had been 
 granted, which he had asked for the day or 
 the titular saint of his parish. 
 
 There was in a corner, quite crest-fallen, a 
 clergyman who had been provided with a. 
 benefice but had not the money which was 
 demanded of him for the expedition of his 
 bulls. In order to'get him out of this difficulty,, 
 there was much against his will, charged upon. 
 that benefice a pension making him a tributary 
 of one who had advanced the required amount.
 
 120 THE WITCH. 
 
 Another told me, that he had resigned his 
 benefice, or rather sold it because he was poor, 
 and could not find any one to advance by way 
 of anticipation, money for the bulls. 
 
 At another table, where equal traffic was 
 going on in bulls and bishoprics and co-adju- 
 tories, and pensions and other such money- 
 sucking commodities, there came up a sort of 
 buffoon, and said to the bystanders : so you 
 also, are of the simple ones who give gold for 
 lead?( 83 ) 
 
 I had not hitherto observed a certain tribu- 
 nal which this market had at its head, and a 
 glimpse of which now caught my eye. A certain 
 personage was presiding in it, and I asked 
 who he was, but no one was in a hurry to give 
 me his real name : a lad merely insinuated to 
 me as through his teeth, that this was one 
 who, in ancient times, had there had, I do
 
 THE WITCH. 1^1 
 
 not know what kind of conversation with the 
 apostle St. Peter. I desisted from this in- 
 quiry, having observed a portion of the market- 
 people running, pushing, and scampering 
 amongst the multitude, as if there were some 
 great good in escaping from that Babylon. 
 
 Why fly ? said I to one of them. We are 
 Arragonese, said he, and an order has just 
 arrived from Don Alfonzo V, commanding us to 
 come out from hence, for it has reached his ear 
 that there is a great plague in this city. I pre- 
 sently discovered that such plague was Simony, 
 and that he who was seated on the throne of 
 that tribunal was Simon Magus. From whence 
 and from what are the Arragonese who are so 
 brave a people flying ? said I to myselfj; it is 
 high time that I, who am but a manchego, 
 should take to my heels also. 
 
 In escaping from this place there came upon 
 
 N
 
 122 THE WITCH. 
 
 me a small, cool, pleasant and vital breeze which 
 made me feel that animation was again re- 
 stored to my sinking and exhausted frame ; 
 and taught me how mortal was that atmosphere 
 which the buyers and sellers in that market 
 were constantly respiring. 
 
 Suddenly the bells began ringing a merry 
 peal, and I followed in the file of the people 
 towards the Quirinal palace, where there 
 was an immense concourse of citizens. I 
 saw Pope Alexander II come out on the 
 balcony to announce the plausible news that 
 Don Sancho of Arragon and Navarre, ceding 
 to the impulses of grace, and to the fire 
 of divine, love, had been converted to the true 
 faith. This announcement greatly surprised 
 me, and I said to a Roman gentleman near me : 
 was this king a Jew, or a gentile, or a heretic ? 
 He was nothing but a Christian catholic, he 
 answered me. Then replied I, how could the
 
 THE WITCH. 123 
 
 Pope say that he ha? been converted to the 
 true faith 1 And how could he add that this 
 conversion was owing to the impulses of grace 
 and to the fire of divine love 1 One may 
 well perceive, replied he, that thou art a 
 stranger in this court. The cardinal Hugo 
 Candido has prevailed on this king, who was 
 recently married to an infanta of France called 
 Felicia, to recognize the supreme temporal 
 dominion of the holy see. And is this, said I, 
 to convert to the true faith? If so, there 
 pertains to the depository of your faith that 
 which does not pertain to the catholic faith. 
 And as this depository of revealed truths forms 
 the essence of your religion, whoever pleases 
 may throw in your teeth that you are of 
 another church. And is it, peradventure, a 
 triumph of religion, that a prince, incautious or 
 seduced by the agents of your court, should 
 abase himself even so as to acknowledge him- 
 self the feudary or the vassal of the Pope ? As 
 N 2
 
 124 THE WITCH. 
 
 to the suggestions of your earthly policy, do 
 you call these the fire of the love of God arid 
 the impulses of grace ? 
 
 I had scarcely returned to myself from the 
 fright which these blasphemies had caused me, 
 when another legate from Arragon named 
 Reyner presented himself at a corner of 
 the street, to give an account to Urban 
 II., that Don Berengarius Count of Barce- 
 lona, had recognised His Holiness as his 
 temporal lord, and bound himself to pay to 
 him a tribute of twenty five pounds of silver. 
 But on this triumph a muleteer from Cata- 
 lonia who came behind him, threw a pitcher 
 of cold water, saying in a loud voice that 
 Berengarius was a ursurper of the title 
 of Count, and a traitor to his brother Don 
 Ramon Berenguer III, and that in order 
 to give a color to his attempt, he had 
 had recourse to the stratagem of acknow-
 
 THE WITCH. 
 
 ledging himself the vassal of the apostoli- 
 cal chair and the muleteer repeated many 
 times: the acceptance of the nuncio in the 
 name of the Pope is unjust and illegal. 
 
 With much coldness that court was viewing 
 this spectacle. But it considered itself compen- 
 sated for the afront by seeing the same Don 
 Ramon made a tributary of Pascual II., and 
 his son a feudatory of Adrian IV. After this 
 came, disputing, the Counts Don Alonzo VII. 
 of Castile and Don Alonzo of Portugal, the 
 latter having just taken the title of king. The 
 Count of Castile was complaining that he 
 might have denied the feud in becoming a 
 subject to the dominion of the Popes Innocent 
 and Lucius II., through the intervention of 
 Cardinal Guido. 
 
 Up went the curtain, and Innocent III ap- 
 peared in the scene, priding himself in having
 
 126 THE WITCH, 
 
 for tributaries, John king of England, Alonzd 
 of Portugal, and Peter II. of Arragon. But 
 it amused me to see this last prince crowned by 
 the Pope with a wreath of un-leaVened bread 
 prepared with subtilty, in order that the 
 Pontiff might not put it on with his feet as he 
 had done on other occasions. Very large 
 indeed appeared the series of comedies and 
 interludes of this kind which were to be 
 performed in that theatre. But I was so 
 annoyed in seeing the temporal power of 
 princes put in ridicule, and the rights of 
 nations trodden under foot in the name of 
 religion, that I said : enough of this, I shall 
 how be off with my music to other dancers. 
 
 And where did I stop ? at a saloon in the 
 Vatican, where a grand table was prepared 
 for a splendid banquet. There were walking 
 about, kings and princes amongst cardinals 
 Uhd prelates and aulics. I do not believe it i
 
 THE WITCH> 127 
 
 possible to see elsewhere in the political 
 world such a majestic spectacle. What ban- 
 quet is this ? I asked, of one who was getting 
 together the pieces of little bouquets. Aft 
 thou ignorant, said he, that yesterday was the 
 coronation-day of our sovereign the Pope, and 
 that this is the banquet of the ceremonial ? A 
 little bell sounded in the room adjoining : the 
 table was covered with a great quantity and 
 variety of eatables : the Pope came forth from 
 liis cabinet ; and after washing his hands, at 
 which act all the legates threw themselves 
 upon their knees, he took the first seat, 
 All the rest were accommodated in the order 
 prescribed from his bench by a Monsignore, 
 "who appeared to be master of the ceremonies. 
 This functionary held in his hand a richly 
 bound book, and said: the Cardinal Bishop N. 
 at the right of His Holiness: in the second 
 place the king of N: after the following 
 cardinal, another king; and thus he placed
 
 128 THE WITCH. 
 
 the rest alternately. And he added, the 
 prince N., being the first son and heir of the 
 throne, takes his seat next after the first 
 Presbyter Cardinal. The other sons and 
 brothers of kings who are not in the service 
 of His Holiness, will sit among the cardinal- 
 deacons, or behind them. 
 
 I was astonished at seeing the royal dignity 
 degraded, in my opinion, on so solemn an oc- 
 sion, and unthinkingly gave a sign of my dis- 
 content, when one of those Monsignori, who 
 must have noticed it, whispered in my ear : 
 dost thou not know that Pius II. declared the 
 Cardinals similar to kings : regum similes?^ 4 ) 
 and that the order of this banquet is prescribed 
 in the Roman ceremonial ? My brother, 
 continued he, in this court, every thing is 
 done according to rule. Is this, said I, one of 
 those rules which St. Peter left recommended 
 to his successors ? At hearing this he cried
 
 THE WITCH. 129 
 
 aloud here here a heretic has in- 
 truded himself. The respectable con- 
 course was disturbed: the guests rose up 
 on their feet. Guards! guards! said an 
 abbot : this is the man, continued the Mon- 
 
 signore. Save me, my witch, I then cried ; 
 
 and when they went to lay hands on me, 
 they found themselves with my shadow. 
 
 Escaped from that danger, I found myself 
 in an apartment hung with white satin, where 
 was the Pope seated on his throne giving 
 his apostolical benediction, calling Don Ra- 
 mon Freire the supreme director of Chili, be- 
 loved son, and congratulating him as the head 
 of that republic, that His Holiness' predecessor 
 had sent to it an apostolical vicar, whose fa- 
 culties His Holiness had already confirmed. 
 
 At that time the constitutional law was in 
 force in Spain shortly afterwards arrived the
 
 130 THE WITCH. 
 
 news that the king had once more usurped the 
 command absolute. The bishops of both 
 Americas, presented themselves, and between 
 them those of Chili. On seeing them the Pope 
 began to bewail, like a Jeremiah, the deplorable 
 state to which the discord of rebellion had 
 reduced those republics, and to exhort 
 them that they should recommend the 
 sublime and solid virtue of Ferdinand VII, 
 promising to recognize them in order to 
 insure a happy and speedy result. I ob- 
 observed that the flatterers who before had 
 applauded the Pope's acknowledgment of 
 the Chillian republic, equally applauded this 
 exhortation ; and I said to one of them : on 
 what principles of sound ethics and rights 
 or nations does the holy father now exhort 
 these bishops, to overthrow in their own 
 country the government which has just been 
 recognized as legitimate ? If, answered he, 
 thou hadst read the works of Belarmine,
 
 THE WITCH. l3l 
 
 thoU Wouldst not be in the dark as to our 
 policy. One of the rules which that grand 
 theologian left us in prescription, is, that 
 the spiritual republic, whose supreme go- 
 vernor is the Pope, can oblige the temporal 
 republic to Vary its administration, and even 
 to depose its sovereigns and establish others 
 when the spiritual welfare requires it. And 
 why, I replied, did not the Pope make this 
 exhortation to the bishops of America, when 
 Ferdinand VII. was the constitutional king ? 
 I should like to know how it is that this zeal 
 to stimulate them to provoke rebellion against 
 their republics, was kept dormant by His 
 Holiness, till the moment in which the king 
 Was seated on his despotic throne ? 
 
 Tell me the truth, brother : has this cabinet 
 influenced itself in effecting the ruin of the 
 Spanish constitution ? I ask this question be* 
 cause I find that in Spain your auxiliary troops
 
 132 THE WITCH. 
 
 preach with unblushing face, that this war 
 against the fundamental law of the state, is holy 
 and religious in as much as it cedes to the 
 spiritual benefit of the church ; and that the 
 pope is the sole and supreme governor of 
 this republic. 
 
 This flatterer changed from pale to red, and 
 
 red to pale, but as to the answer ? He had 
 
 none to give. Another question I am going 
 to ask you, continued I, and forgive my frank- 
 ness. Was it convenient to the spiritual 
 republic, I should say to your court, that 
 Portugal should change its administration, and 
 that the acts of a usurper should prevail 
 against the rights of a ligitimate queen? be- 
 cause, I see that there are also in that kingdom 
 apostles, and that these enemies of the con- 
 stitution given by the emperor, are repeating 
 the carnivals of Spain, presenting themselves 
 in the mask and disguise of religion. And
 
 THE WITCH. 133 
 
 now for another question : has there not also 
 some pecuniary succour gone forth from the 
 pontifical treasury ? because the remittance of 
 Roman crowns made to the new apostolate of 
 Spain, I take to be as likely as that of francs 
 from the French clergy, or that of guineas 
 from England and Ireland. 
 
 My want of caution attracted the attention 
 tion of six personages each of whom was 
 dressed in clothes of a different colour. 
 These were lounging about the august 
 throne, had heard my expostulation, and 
 were at once attracted by the tone and 
 manner of my address. Who art thou ? 
 asked one of them. And the question was 
 not the worst part of the business, for he 
 seized me at the same time by the fleshy 
 part of my arms, and thrust his nails 
 into me. Said I to myself, this must be a 
 police officer dressed up as a courtier: the
 
 134 THE WITCH. 
 
 invention and stratagems of modern Rome ! 
 who can fathom them ? None but a trickster 
 or a Gipsy. And now for my wits. A 
 Jesuit of the short cassock, I answered him. 
 Thou liest, said he, getting angry. Stop 
 a little, reverend father in Christ, I re- 
 plied: these are great words; here is my 
 scapulary. To my good luck, this gentle- 
 man was of the same company and so 
 were the five others of his companions, 
 as well as this very Pope. 
 
 On seeing the countersign of our free- 
 masonry he gave me a hearty embrace and a 
 pair of kisses on each cheek; and turning 
 all his anger into meekness, I am sorry, 
 said he, that, being by thy profession a de- 
 fender of this holy see, thou speakest of her 
 with the disrespect of her competitors. Hast 
 thou visited Father Fortis ? I am going 
 some of these days said he, to be occupied in
 
 THE WITCH. 135 
 
 the expediting of some bulls and I have not 
 yet had leisure to present myself to his rever- 
 ence. To-morrow, he continued, is a holiday, 
 it being the fast of St. Ignatius and the Pope 
 goes to sing the mass. Come thou to my 
 palace at nine in the morning, and I will take 
 thee in my carriage. To-day thou shalt dine 
 with me and I will give thee a taste of the 
 wine of Alicante, which the good Ostolaza 
 has sent as a present to our brethern ol % 
 Montrouge. 
 
 Blessed scapulary ! I exclaimed. If this 
 journey, which is contraband, were even like 
 those which are made regularly during the 
 holy year, already I had run my course, 
 and if I were to detain myself here one 
 day more, who knows how my blessed Witch 
 might take it ? 
 
 Very badly, answered she. And turning
 
 136 THE WITCH. 
 
 my eyes, there I saw her at my side. By 
 what road hast thou come here, thou great 
 demon, I asked her. By the same as thou, 
 she replied, dost thou think that I have 
 ever left thee all the night? it is already 
 four in the morning. I must return to my 
 council, to give an account of this expedi- 
 tion. If thou likest that the same fete should 
 be repeated, there thou wilt find me from 
 morn till night. The other ounce of gold 
 leave thou upon the garden wall, that there 
 may not be wanting some one to go and take 
 it. On saying this, the whole farce vanished 
 like a breath, and I found myself once more 
 sitting on my bed as if no such thing had 
 happened. 
 
 Now let us see, ye incredulous gossips, if 
 ye dare venture to say that there are no 
 WITCHES.
 
 NOTES.
 
 NOTES. 
 
 NOTE 1, PAGE 6. 
 
 The three-corncr-hatted assistants of the Company. 
 The dress of a cardinal is a red soutane, a rochet, a short 
 purple mantle, and a red three-cornered hat. They began 
 to wear the red hat at the Council of Lyons, in 1243. 
 
 NOTE 2, PAGE 8. 
 
 Lector lego. Lectores, among the ancient Romans, 
 were servants in the houses of the Patricians who read 
 while their masters were at supper. They were called by 
 the Greeks Anagnostae. The expression Lector lego, how- 
 ever, as used in the present instance somewhat sarcasti- 
 cally, not only signifies a lay -reader but has an especial 
 reference to those lay -brothers of religious houses, whose 
 duties are chiefly of a domestic kind ; a knowledge of the 
 dead languages is therefore not absolutely necessary to fit 
 them for their station, and although they go the whole 
 length of belief in the creed of their superiors, we do not
 
 140 NOTES. 
 
 find that they make any scrupulous enquiries touching the 
 why and the wherefore ; hence the editor of the original 
 work observes, that " with their free will and consent the 
 Jwad kas remained integral." 
 
 NOTE 3, PAGE 9. 
 
 When the Inquisitors give thanks to God. In the dark 
 ages of cruelty and superstition, when vast numbers of 
 reputed witches were tried, convicted, condemned, and 
 burned with great ceremony by order of the Inquisition, it 
 appears to have been the custom of the authorities both 
 ecclesiastical and secular to assemble in their churches on 
 the occasion of such sacrifices of human life, in order to 
 give thanks to God for what they considered a merciful 
 display of his goodness in enabling them to discover and 
 destroy those who had, as was supposed, entered into 
 compact with the devil. This religious festival does not 
 appear to have differed materially, if at all, from that 
 usually celebrated on the occasion of burning heretics and 
 others whose crimes came under the jurisdiction of that 
 tribunal ; for, whether the shrivelled body of some poor 
 old woman reputed to be a witch, or the more vigorous and 
 buoyant limbs of a youthful heretic were to be consumed 
 ut the stake, the ceremony was designated an Auto-da-ft. 
 
 In Seville 800 persons were apprehended, chiefly for 
 heresy, and imprisoned, and laid up for a festival of this 
 kind, in the year 1557. Many of them were burned in 
 fcucfessive executions of fifteen or twenty at a time. The
 
 NOTES. 141 
 
 most cruel t ortures were applied for the purpose of forcing 
 them to confess their associates, their connexions, their 
 friends, their favorers, the nature of their books, their in- 
 structors, and the whole ramifications of that heretical 
 conspiracy which the tribunal was determined to destroy, 
 root and branch. By extreme agony on the rack, Mary 
 Bohorquia, a young lady of noble birth, who was burned 
 for being a Lutheran, was driven to confess that she had 
 conversed on religious subjects with her sister Dona 
 Juana Ponce de Leon, wife of Lord de la Heguera. Thia 
 lady was immediately apprehended, confined in a loath- 
 some dungeon, though far gone in her pregnancy, and a 
 few days after her delivery, tortured with such diabolical 
 rigor, that the ropes cut into the very bones of her arms, 
 legs, and thighs. She died after this inhuman treatment, 
 when the fiends who inflicted it, in order to make her 
 atonement, or rather to deprive the reformation of the 
 glory of such a martyr, pronounced her innocent of heresy. 
 In May 1559, an auto-da-fe was celebrated at Valladolid 
 which was attended by the Regent of Spain, in the absence 
 of Philip, Prince Charles, and all the dignitaries and au- 
 thorities of the state, when thirty persons were brought 
 forth, fourteen of whom were committed to the flames. 
 At the entrance of Philip into his capital, and into the 
 active government of his kingdom in the October of the 
 same year, he was regaled by another sacrifice more splen- 
 did and imposing than the last, from the number of the vic- 
 tims, which amounted to forty, twenty of whom were 
 burned, from the greater attendance of guards, courtiers, 
 grandees, and authorities, and from the more extensive and 
 gorgeous display of inquisitorial pageantry. A protestant 
 nobleman, Don Carlos de Sesso, when passing to the stake
 
 142 NOTES. 
 
 cried out to the king for mercy. " No," answered the 
 bigot, with a stern countenance, " I would bring wood to 
 burn my own son were he such a wretch as you !" and 
 continued to view the horrific ceremony with the greatest 
 coolness. As part of the forms of this terrible day, the 
 inquisitor-general demanded of the monarch the continu- 
 ance of his protection to the tribunal, repeating blasphe- 
 mously the words, " Domine, adjuva nos," and the king 
 standing and grasping his sword, half unsheathed it, in 
 token of his zealous compliance. 
 
 The culprit, after undergoing the torture and a long im- 
 prisonment, was at last handed over to the secular power as 
 impenitent, contumacious, or relapsed ; and the spectacle 
 exhibited to the people, was now still more cruel and ter- 
 rible than that which the holy fathers endured in their 
 pitiless dungeons. The condemned were led forth to exe- 
 cution by burning, which is the most terrible death says a 
 Spanish author, for the most horrible of crimes ; and of 
 this display of suppliciary vengeance the most tremendous 
 and awful solemnity was made. Notice was given at the 
 churches, that on a particular day, generally a festival or 
 Sunday, an act of the faith, which originally meant a ser- 
 mon concerning the faith preached on such occasions, would 
 be given at such a particular place, and an indulgence of 
 forty days offered to all who should go to witness the trans- 
 actions there to be performed : the torments and punish- 
 ments of heretics. Great crowds of the faithful attended - 
 the monasteries sent forth their tribes the clergy, from a 
 considerable distance, poured towards the execution the 
 civil authorities of all classes were on duty the greatest 
 preparations were made the boll of the cathedral tolled
 
 NOTES. 143 
 
 the standard of the inquisition was unfurled and the train 
 of heretics, dressed in sackcloth painted with flames, 
 devils, and monsters, and walking barefooted accompanied 
 by cannibals which I have neither space nor desire to 
 describe, proceeded, first, in procession from the prison to 
 the holy office to hear a sermon, and then to the place of 
 execution. The prisoners were frequently reserved till 
 there was a sufficient accumulation of them for one grand 
 tragedy. To this entertainment, kings, princes, grandees, 
 and courtiers, were invited, as to a magnificent bull-fight, 
 a splendid display of fire-works, or a gorgeous theatrical 
 exhibition. The effect of the pageant was not to be weak- 
 ened by the emotions of pity. Philip II enjoyed the sight 
 with a countenance and a heart unmoved. Charles II had 
 the most pompous one ever exhibited, prescribed to him 
 as a medicine. It will be seen in accounts of these spec- 
 tacles, with what unmoistened eyes and unruffled features 
 even the ladies of the court beheld the writhings and con- 
 vulsions of these suffering wretches, heard their horrible 
 cries, and resisted their moving appeals. To have shed 
 tears would have been a crime. They would as soon have 
 wept over Satan on the burning lake. Philip III is said 
 to have expiated with his blood, some natural tears shed 
 by him on this occasion ; that is, with a drop of his blood 
 drawn by the inquisitor-general, and burned by the hands 
 of the common executioner as an emblem of the punish- 
 ment such heretical sympathy deserved. The preacher 
 who delivered the sermon of the faith, at the great 
 auto-da-fe before Charles II in 1680, where 120 pri- 
 soners were present, nineteen of whom were in an hour 
 to be cast into the flames, in the plenitude of his joy 
 burst into an appropriation of the words of the Canticles :
 
 144 NOTES. 
 
 " Ah ! thou holy tribunal ! " said he, " for boundless ages 
 may'st thou keep us firm in the faith, and promote the 
 punishment of the enemies of God. Of thee I may say 
 what the Holy Spirit said of the church, ' Thou art fair, 
 my love, thon art fair as the tents of Kedar, as the sightly 
 skins of Solomon.' " Of the infuriated conduct of the 
 people on such occasions, the following account from Dr. 
 Geddes will be a sufficient specimen. " At the place of 
 execution in Lisbon, there are as many stakes set up as 
 there are prisoners to be burned, with a good quantity of 
 dry furze about them. The stakes of the professed are 
 about four yards high, and have a small board within half 
 a yard of the top. The negative and relapsed being first 
 strangled and burned, the professed go up the ladder 
 betwixt the two Jesuits who have attended them all ; and 
 when they come up to the board they turn round to the 
 people, and the Jesuits spend nearly a quarter of an hour 
 in exhorting them to be reconciled to the Church of Rome, 
 which if they refuse to do, the Jesuits come down and the 
 executioner ascends, and having turned the professed oft' 
 the ladder upon the seat, and chained their bodies close 
 to the stake, the Jesuits renew their exhortation, and, at 
 parting, tell them that they leave them to the devil, who 
 is standing at their elbow to carry their souls to hell as 
 soon as they are out of their bodies." 
 
 Scenes, at the description of which the flesh creeps and 
 the heart is horror-struck, were often presented at these 
 spectacles. The prisoners frequently resisted with the 
 greatest fury, struggling to free themselves from the stake, 
 while the incarnate fiends allowed the fire to fall away, or 
 added fuel as suited their purpose to heighten or to prolong
 
 NOTES. 145 
 
 their torments. Sometimes the exultation of martyrdom 
 was expressed in the defiance of despair. Francisco 
 Botello, a Jew, when brought forth for execution was 
 shewn to his wife, who, without his knowledge, made 
 one of the same Auto, " but such was his shameful 
 conduct," says the report, " that he beheld her with as 
 much joy as if it had been the happiest day of his life, 
 animating a friend who was burning beside him to die 
 in his own lame faith." "Francisco Lopez," says ano- 
 the report, who burnt in an Auto celebrated at Mexico in 
 1659, stood on the platform of the stage in a most contu- 
 macious manner, and, resembling a demon, cast forth 
 sparks from his eyes and gave, beforehand, signs of his 
 eternal condemnation." 
 
 Sometimes the sufferers, in their lingering torments, 
 made the most pathetic appeals to the sympathy of the 
 spectators, not for a release from their doom but a more 
 speedy dispatch of their agony. " of the five persons con- 
 demned ' says Mr. Wilcox, afterwards Bishop of Glouces- 
 ter, in a letter to Dr. Burnet, spkeaking of an Auto cele- 
 brated at Lisbon, on the 10th December, 1705, " there 
 were but four burned. Two were first strangled, two, a 
 man and a woman, were burned alive. The execution 
 was very cruel the woman was alive in the flames half 
 an hour, and the man above an hour. The present king 
 and his brother were seated in a window so near as to be 
 addressed in very moving terms by the man while he was 
 burning. The favor he asked was only a few more faggots, 
 yet he was unable to obtain it. Those who are burned 
 here are seated on a bench twelve feet high, fastened to a 
 pole, and above six feet higher than the faggots. The 
 wind being a little fresh, the man's hinder parts were per- 
 P
 
 146 NOTES. 
 
 fectly wasted, and as he turned himself his ribs opened 
 before he left speaking; the fire being recruited as it 
 wasted, to keep it just in the same degree of heat. All his 
 entreaties could not procure him a larger allowance of 
 wood to shorten his misery. 
 
 The last instance of barbarity carried to the length of 
 burning for heresy at Seville, was in 1781, on the per- 
 son of a woman who had been guilty of licentious irregu- 
 larities, and justified her conduct by special revelations 
 from an angel. The power of the inquisition was still con- 
 siderable after its holocausts had ceased ; but it was exerted 
 rather in encouraging, petty vexations, enjoining ridiculous 
 penances, and prohibiting useful books, than in serious 
 acts of outrage. The last Auto of any consequence cele- 
 brated by the inquisition, was in 1781, and excited the 
 ridicule of all Madrid. Ignatio Rodriguez, a common 
 beggar, was condemned to wholesome penance for deserting 
 his mendicant profession, turning sorcerer, and making 
 love-powders ! 
 
 NOTE 4, PAGE 9. 
 
 The precious jewels of Zugarramurdi. Zugarramurdi 
 is a small village situated in one of the most romantic 
 parts of the kingdom of Navarre in Spain. It consists of 
 only a few houses which, with their various apartments 
 are partly formed by nature, and partly hewn out of solid 
 rocks, something like the dwellings in Petra, the capital of 
 Idumea. It also contains a small church. In the days of 
 superstition, when the belief in the existence of witches
 
 NOTES. 
 
 was current all over the Peninsula, this peaceful little 
 hamlet was considered as their strong hold ; and here the 
 Holy Office of the Inquisition spread terror and dismay 
 by its barbarous cruelties'in hunting out, arresting, impri- 
 soning, condemning, and burning at the stake for the al- 
 leged crime of witchcraft and sorcery, a great number 
 of the deluded inhabitants of this village and its neigh- 
 bourhood. 
 
 Julius II. had declared the crime of witchcraft to be 
 within the jurisdiction of the Inquisition, but the Inquisi- 
 tion of Arragon had, it seems, taken cognizance of magic 
 and sorcery ever since the Pontificate of John XXII. 
 The inquisition of Calahorra burned more than thirty 
 women as sorceresses and magicians in the year 1507. 
 
 The history of the sorceresses of the valley of the Bastan 
 in Navarre has been particularly celebrated. These 
 women were taken before the Inquisition of Logrono 
 and confessed the greatest extravagancies. This took 
 place in 1610, and on the occasion an auto-da-fd, was 
 celebrated after the condemnation of fifty-two of these 
 unhappy creatures. Llorente, who translated his own 
 Spanish MS., or at least personally superintended its 
 translation into the French language, thus records that 
 memorable event. " Le 7 et le 8 Novembre 1610, les in- 
 quisiteurs de Logrono celbrerent un auto-da-fe des plus 
 solennels, apres avoir condamue cinquante-deux per- 
 sonnes ; onze a la relaxation, vingt a la reconciliation et 
 vingt une a diverses penitences. Parmi celles qui avaient 
 et relaxees, six furent bruises en re"alit, et cinq en 
 effigie, avec leurs ossemena qu'on avait exhumes; on
 
 148 NOTES. 
 
 comptait parmi les autres, six blasphe'matcurs ; huit 
 autcurs de propositions suspcctes ; six juda'isans ; un 
 mahometisant ; un lutherien ; deux voleurs, ministres sup- 
 poses du saint-office, et dix-huit sorciers. 
 
 J'ai deja ditque chaque tribunal de 1'Inquisition celebrait 
 tous les ans, au moins, un auto-da-fe, compose d'un nom- 
 bre plus ou moins considerable de yictimes ; je pourrais 
 done, ce semble, me dispenser de faire mention de celui- 
 ci ; mais, Je me crois oblige d'en parler, parce qu'il offre 
 des circonstance qui le rendent digne d'une mention par- 
 ticuliere. Les onze individus qui furent condamnes a elre 
 relaxes, et dix-huit des reconcilies, faisaient partie d'une 
 secte de sorciers, Leurs declarations furent Tranches et 
 fort (itendues, ce qu'on n'avait pu obtenir des six individus 
 condamnes a la relaxation. Us expliquerent la nature de 
 cette association, son systeme et ses ceuvres ; les details 
 qu'ils donnerent sont si nombreux et si varies, que malgre 
 toutce que j'ai pu dire ailleurs sur cette matiere, j'en par- 
 lerai encore ici afin d'e'claircir, s'il est possible, un sujet 
 qui a fait debiter dans tous les temps, un si grand nombre 
 de fables. 
 
 Si 1'on peut compter sur les confessions des dix-huit 
 reconcilies et de Marie de Zuzaya qui fut relaxee comme 
 dogmatisante, les vingt-neuf condamnes etuient du bourg 
 de Vcra du lieu de Zugarramurdi dans la vallee de Bastan, 
 au royaume de Navarre, sur la frontiere de France. Us 
 nommaient leur assemblee Aquclarre, mot gascon, qui 
 signifie pre du Boitc, parce qu'elle se tenait dans un pre 
 oil le diable avait coutume de se presenter a eux sous la 
 figure dc cet animal.
 
 NOTES. 149 
 
 Le lundi, le mercredi et le vendredi dc chaque semaine 
 etaient marques pour les assemblies, outre les grandes 
 fetes de 1'Eglise, comme Paques, la Pentecote, Noel ; et, 
 de meme que ces jours sont consacres d'une maniere plus 
 speciale et plus solennelle, au culte que les Chretiens ren- 
 dent a Dieu, de meme aussi, il plaisait au demon que ses 
 adorateurs choisissent les memes jours pour 1'honorer plus 
 particuliennent. 
 
 L'assemble'e des sorciers de Zugarramurdi fut decouverte 
 par une petite fille de France qu'on avait mise chez une 
 femme de 1'endroit, laquelle etait sorciere elle-meme, et 
 menait souvent a 1'assemblee cette enfant trop jeune 
 encore pour etre traitee comme novice. Lorsqu'on 1'eut 
 ramenee dans sa famille, une de ses compatriotes la pressa 
 de se faire sorciere, et lorsqu'elle se fut decidee elle renon^a 
 a tous les articles de la foi, excepte au culte qu'elle voulait 
 tour jours rendre a la Sainte-Vierge : un an et demi aprcs, 
 elle fut attaquee d'une maladie grave, se repentit et obtint 
 1'absolution de 1'eveque de Bayonne; etant retournee 
 ensuite a Zugarramurdi, elle y vit Marie Jurreteguia, et 
 lui dit qu'elle savait qu'elle etait sorciere. Sonmari en fut 
 informe et lui en fit des reproches ; celle-ci nia^le fait ; ce- 
 pendant 1'autre donna des preuves si evidentes qu'elles 
 etaient allees plusieurs fois ensemble au pre du Bouc, qne 
 Marie se voyant convaincue, avoua tout, se repentit sin- 
 cerement et decouvrit, devant 1'Inquisition de Logrono, 
 tout ce qui se passait parmi les sorciers. On se contenta 
 de lui faire porter le San Benito pendant Fauto-da-fi, qui 
 suivit son jugement, et elle cut la permission d'habiter sa
 
 1.50 NOTES. 
 
 maison sans autre penitence que ce qu'elle avait deja 
 souflerte pendant sa reclusion oil elle fat cependant traitee 
 avec douceur, a cause de la since'rite de son repentir. 
 
 Michel de Goiburu, roi des sorciers de Zugarramurdi, 
 avoua cc qui se passait en general dans lea assemblies de 
 la secte ; 
 
 Jean de Gioburu, frere de Michel, man de Oracienne 
 de Barrenecha, la reine des sorciers, confessa les memes 
 choses. 
 
 Gracienne de Barrenechea, la reine des sorciers, confessa 
 qu' ayant etc jalouse de Marie-Jean de Oria, a cause de 
 1'amour que le diable avait pour cette femme, elle ne 
 negligea rien pour la rendre infidele ; qu'en e"tant venue 
 a bout, elle lui demanda la permission de causer la mort 
 de sa rivale, et qu'ayant obtenu son consentement elle 
 commit cet homicide pendant que sa victime dormait 
 tranquillement dans sa chambre, 
 
 Telle est 1'histoire abre"gee des proces des sorciers de Lo- 
 grono, proces dont le tribunal connaissait parfaitement la 
 conduite, puisque deja il avait puni en 1507 plus de trente 
 sorciers, et en 1527, cent cinquante autres.
 
 NOTES. 151 
 
 Among other persons charged with these crimes in the 
 dark ages, was the famous Magician Doctor Eugene Tor- 
 ralba, a physician of Cuenca in 1501 who was kept a pri- 
 soner in the Inquisition for four years. The reader of the 
 imperishable work of Cervantes will at once remember the 
 mention of this personage by Don Quixote in the noted 
 adventure of the Countess Trafaldi. The Knight being 
 mounted on Clavileno with Sancho Panza behind him, 
 their eyes being blindfolded, Sancho wishes to uncover him- 
 self in order to ascertain if they have yet arrived at the re- 
 gion of fire, but the Knight thus addresses him : " Do thou 
 " nothing of the sort, and remember the true account of 
 " the Licentiate Torralba, a Knight who was carried 
 " through the air by flying devils upon a cane; he but 
 " closed his eyes and in twelve hours arrived at Rome, 
 " alighting on the Tower of Nona, which is a street of 
 " that city, and saw all the fray, assault and death of 
 " Bourbon, and by the morning he had returned to Madrid, 
 " where he gave an account of all that he had seen, 
 " and said, that when he was brushing through the air the 
 ' devil commanded him to open his eyes, which he did, 
 " and saw himself, to all appearance, so near the body of 
 " the moon that he could have touched her with his hand, 
 " and that he dared not so much as to look down at the 
 " earth lest he should go off into a swoon." 
 
 The belief in witchcraft was general throughout Europe 
 until the former part of the seventeenth century. Sorcery 
 was made felony without benefit of clergy, by 33 Hen. 
 VIII, c. 8, and James I, c. 12. These were repealed by 
 an Act of Parliament in the ninth year of the reign of 
 Geo. II. c. 5. The reign of Elizabeth was fruitful in su-
 
 152 NOTES. 
 
 perstition. The reformed religion had as yet done little 
 towards abolishing those barbarous customs and preju- 
 dices, the remnants of a rude and ignorant age. Witch" 
 craft was not thought inconsistent with the new orthodoxy : 
 it was not confined to the mere vulgar herd but pervaded 
 every class of society, from the cottage to the throne. The 
 clergy were not backward in sounding the alarm ; de- 
 nouncing from their pulpits all those who were suspected 
 of being its ministers. And on whom did the suspicion 
 light ? On such women " which be commonly old, lame, 
 " bleireeid, pale, fowle, and full of wrinkles ; poore, sullen, 
 " and papists." These were accused of holding dominion 
 not only over the destinies of men and cattle, but over 
 the elements themselves ! If the wind blew, or a storm 
 arose, the cry was " Ring the bells and burn the witches." 
 If a farmer's crop was blighted, or a murrian spread 
 amongst his cattle, it was the avowed handy work of these 
 malignant old ladies. Nay, if Her Majesty suffered " un- 
 " der excessive anguish by pains of her teeth," it was cha- 
 ritably attributed to their diabolical agency. The accession 
 of King James to the throne fairly put the seal to this ab- 
 surd and cruel superstition. The re -publication of his 
 Daemonologie in 1603, added to the popular phrensy ; and 
 the popish flames that had barely ceased to smoke from 
 the burning of heretics, were rekindled with true /ana- 
 tic fury for the purpose of exterminating this unhappy 
 race. 
 
 A trial of Witches took place at Bury St. Edmunds, 
 10 March, 1664, before Sir Matthew Hale, which lasted 
 the whole day and ended in the conviction of the un- 
 fortunate creatures indicted. It Is awful to contemplate
 
 NOTES. 153 
 
 the sacrifice of human life which resulted from such 
 convictions, particularly on reading what was called 
 the evidence against the prisoners. It would be foreign 
 to the object of a note like the present to make further 
 allusion to the tissue of nonsense, to the improbabilities, 
 and to the indecencies of that day's proceedings, but 
 an extract from the summing up of that great and good 
 man may be both amusing and interesting : " That there 
 " were such creatures as witches he made no doubt at 
 " all, for in the first place, the scriptures had affirmed so 
 " much. Secondly, the wisdom of all nations had pro- 
 " vided laws against such persons, which was an argu. 
 " ment of their confidence of such a crime. And such 
 " hath been the judgment of this kingdom as appears 
 " by that Act of Parliament which hath provided punish. 
 " ments proportionable to the quality of the offence. He 
 " told them to observe strictly the evidence, and desired 
 " the great God of Heaven to direct their hearts in 
 " this weighty thing they had in hand ; for, to condemn 
 " the innocent and to let the guilty go free, were both 
 " an abomination to the Lord." The sentence on the 
 culprits was, that they should be hanged, which was 
 accordingly executed in due form of law, on Monday, 
 17th March, 1664, 
 
 NOTE 5, PAGE 14. 
 Hasta verte bum Jesus. Until I see thee, good Jesus. 
 
 Q
 
 1 .34 NOTES. 
 
 NOTE G, PAGE 17. 
 Mare magnum. Great sea. 
 
 NOTE 7, PAGE 24. 
 
 Icarus. A son of Dosdalus, who, with his father, fled 
 with wings from Crete to escape from the resentment 
 of Minos. He unfortunately directed his flight too high, 
 the sun melted the wax which cemented his wings, and he 
 fell into that part of the JEgxsm sea which was called after 
 his name. 
 
 NOTE 8, PAGE 24. 
 
 And another who from a slack rope, $c. This was Lu- 
 nardi the celebrated Aeronaut who, on the occasion re- 
 ferred to, had made an ascent from Madrid. 
 
 NOTE 9, PAGE 25. 
 
 The Mountains of Ubeda. Ubeda is a large inland town 
 of Spain, in the Kingdom of Jaen in the province of An- 
 dalusia. The mountains alluded to are in the vicinity of 
 Ubeda.
 
 NOTES. 155 
 
 NOTE 10, PAGE 2G. 
 
 Three hundred thousand reals. About three thousand 
 one hundred and twenty five pounds sterling. 
 
 NOTE 11, PAGE 27. 
 
 Escurial. A village and royal residence, fifteen miles 
 N. W. of Madrid, Spain. It is the largest and most superb 
 structure in the kingdom, and one of the finest in Europe. 
 The word, Escurial, is Arabic, meaning " a place of rocks." 
 The motive for erecting the palace was to commemorate a 
 victory which Philip II obtained over the French, at St. 
 Quintin, on St. LawTence's day, in the year 1557. The 
 Spanish description of the structure, forms a consider- 
 able 4to volume. The whole building was, according to 
 Marianna, completed in something less than thirty years. 
 The Spaniards call it la octava maravilla, the eighth 
 wonder. Philip, before the commencement of the battle 
 of St. Quintin, vowed, that if siiccessful, he would build the 
 most magnificent convent in the world in honor of the 
 saint whose name should be found for that day in the 
 calendar. The battle being won, it was ascertained that 
 San Lorenzo, (Saint Lawrence,) was the lucky patron ; 
 and means were taken for the fulfilment of the vow. It 
 was discovered also, that according to the legend, this 
 saint had suffered death by being roasted on a gridiron ; 
 and the architect, Juan Baptista de Toledo, at once deter- 
 mined to build the convent in the form of that culinary
 
 156 NOTES. 
 
 instrument. " With this view," say the author of A Year 
 in Spain, " he represented the several bars by files of 
 " building, the handle by a portion of the church, and even 
 " the feet of his singular model, by four insignificant towers 
 " which rise at the corners. Indeed, the only poetic license 
 " which he was guilty of, was in supposing his gridiron to 
 " be upside down." 
 
 Mr. Inglis says that " it is confessedly the most wonderful 
 " edifice in Europe, whether in dimensions or riches." 
 Perhaps the reader may form some idea of its greatness, 
 when told that it has 1,860 rooms, 12,000 windows and 
 doors, 80 staircases, 73 fountains, 48 wine cellars, 8 organs, 
 and 51 bells. It contains also 1,560 oil paintings; and the 
 frescos, if all brought together, would form a square of 
 1,100 feet. Its circumference is 4, 800 feet nearly a mile. 
 
 The church is a wonderful structure : Mr. Inglis says 
 that it certainly exceeded any thing which he had previously 
 imagined: " The riches of Spain," he says, " and her 
 " ancient colonies, are exhausted in the materials, marbles, 
 
 porphyries, jaspers of infinite variety, and of the most 
 " extraordinary beauty, gold, silver, and precious stones ; 
 " and the splendid effect of the whole is not lessened by a 
 " nearer inspection : there is no deception, no glitter all 
 " is real. The whole of the altar-piece in the Capilla 
 " Mayor, upwards of 90 feet high and 50 broad, is one 
 " mass of jasper, porphyry, marble and bronze gilded ; the 
 "18 pillars that adorn it, each 18 feet high, are of deep 
 " red and green jasper, and the intervals are of porphyry and 
 " marble of the most exquisite polish, and the greatest vari- 
 " ety of color. It is, in fact, impossible to turn the eye in
 
 NOTES. 157 
 
 any direction in which it does not rest upon the rarest 
 treasures of nature, or the most excellent works of 
 art." 
 
 NOTE 12, PAGE 32. 
 
 Quod non fecerunt barbari, fecerunt BARBEEINI. What 
 the barbarians left undone, the Barbarini [or little barba- 
 rians] accomplished. The family name of Urban VIII was 
 Barberini. 
 
 NOTE 13, PAGE 33. 
 
 Si mei nonfuissent domhiati, tuncimmaculatwessem. If 
 my children had not been made Lords, I should then have 
 been guiltless. 
 
 NOTE 14, PAGE 34. 
 Nemini. To nobody. 
 
 NOTE 15, PAGE 36. 
 
 The brook Kedron, or Cedron, or Kidron. In ancient 
 geography, a brook or rivulet of Judea, between Jerusalem 
 and Mount Olivet, on the East. St. John calls it a brook, 
 but Josephus, a deep valley. Maundrel speaks of it as 
 being a brook only in winter or in the wet seasons. The
 
 158 NOTES. 
 
 valley was called Jehoshaphat, or the valley of the son of 
 Himioni. It winds its course along the west side of the 
 Mount of Olives, and discharges itself into the dead sea. 
 We read that David forded this brook in flying from Absa- 
 lom. Jesus Christ also crossed it in his way to the garden 
 of Gethsemane. 2 Sam. xv. 23. John xviii. I. The valley 
 through which the Kedron runs, is about the length of 
 thirteen miles, and it was near its western extremity, that 
 Asa, Hezekiah, and Josiah, burnt the idols of their pre- 
 decessors. 1 Kings xv. 3. 2 Chron. xxiv. 16. 2 Kings 
 xxxiii. 3. An English writer has thus beautifully alluded 
 to this rivulet, in the following parody : 
 
 " Thou soft flowing Kedron, by whose silver stream 
 " The Saviour at midnight, when Cynthia's pale beam 
 " Shone bright on the mountains, would frequently stray, 
 " And lose in thy murmurs the toils of the day." 
 
 NOTE 16, PAGE 40. 
 JJotu proprio. Of his own motion. 
 
 
 NOTE 17, PAGE 41. 
 
 The servants of the servants of God. The Pope, in his 
 bulls boasts that lie is the servant of the servants of God 
 
 " SERVUS SERVOKUM DEI."
 
 NOTES. 159 
 
 NOTK 18, PAGE 43. 
 I have established thee over kings and kingdoms Jer. i. 10. 
 
 E 19, PAGE 43. 
 He shall have dominion from sea to sea. Psalm Ixxii. 8. 
 
 NOTE 20, PAGE 44. 
 
 All the kings of the earth shall adore him and shall serve 
 him. Psalm Ixxii. 11. 
 
 NOTE 21, PAGE 44. 
 He shall reign in the house of Jacob for ever. Luke i. 33. 
 
 NOTE 22, PAGE 44. 
 
 Thou shalt also suck the milk of the nations, and shalt be 
 fed at the breast of kings. Isa. Ix. 16. 
 
 NOTE 23, PAGE 44. 
 Lion of the tribe of Judah. ReT. Y. 5.
 
 1GO NOTES. 
 
 NOTE 24, PAGE 44. 
 
 Eneas Silvio. Eneas Sylvius Piccolomini was born at 
 Corsignane, in Sienna, 1405. He ascended the papal 
 throne in 1458. under the name of Pius II, previous 
 to which he was secretary to the Council of Basle, 
 and defended the rights of the councils against the 
 Popes; but on being raised to the papal chair, he 
 retracted all his former writings against the extent of 
 the papal power. He died in 1464. 
 
 NOTE 25, PAGE 44. 
 
 Sunt interprctationes paparum, suas fimbrias intenden- 
 tium. They are the interpretations of the Popes, 
 looking to the hems of their own robes. 
 
 NOTE 26, PAGE 45. 
 
 His last stipper in the vineyard of the Cardinal Adrian 
 Cornetto. Pope Alexander VI, and his son Valentine 
 had formed the design of poisoning Adrian Cornetto, 
 better known as Adrian Castello. In order the better 
 to carry this diabolical scheme into effect, Alexander 
 gave to his butler particular directions about the 
 bottle to which the fatal drug was to be introduced, 
 and under pretence of partaking of his friend's hospi- 
 tality the deed was to be accomplished in the vineyard 
 of the intended victim. By some mistake however, or 
 what is more probable, by an over -ruling providence,
 
 NOTES. 161 
 
 the prepared potion was served up to Alexander and 
 his son Valentine which they drank off and Alexander 
 died from its effects, but Valentine by the prompt 
 use of potent medicines ultimately recovered. Adrian 
 thus miraculously escaped with his life. This Tragedy 
 is thus narrated by Guiccardini in his Istoria d' Italia. 
 
 Ecco che nel colmo pui alto delle magiori speranze, 
 come sono vani, e fallaci i pensicri degli nomini; il Pon- 
 tefice da una vigna appresso a Vaticano, dove era andato a 
 cenare per ricrearsi dai caldi, e repentinamente portato 
 per morto nel palazzo Pontificale, e incontinente dietro e 
 portato per morto il figliuolo ; e il giorno seguente, che fu 
 il decimo ottavo dl d'Agosto, & portato morto secondo 
 1'uso dei Pontefici nella Chiesa di San Piero, nero, enfiato, 
 e bruttissimo, segni manifestissimi di veleno ; ma il Valen- 
 tino col vigore dell' eta, e per avere usato subito medicine 
 potenti, e appropriate al veleno, salv5 la vita, remanendo 
 oppresso da lunga, e grave infermita. 
 
 Credettesi constantemente, che qiiesto accidente fosse 
 proceduto da veleno, e si racconta, seconda la fama piA 
 comune, 1'ordine della cosa in questo modo. Che avendo 
 il Valentino, destinato alia medessima cena, deliberato di 
 awelenare Adriano Cardinale di Corneto, nella vigna 
 del quale dovevano cenare, perche cosa manifests,, essere 
 stata consuetudine frequente del padre, e sua, non solo di 
 usare il veleno per vendicarsi contro agl'inimici, o per assi- 
 curarsi dei sospetti, ma eziandio per scellerata cupidita di 
 spogliare delle proprie facolta le persone riche, i Cardinal! 
 e altri Cortigiani, non avendo rispetto, che da essi non 
 avessero mai ricevuta offesa alcuna, come fu il Cardinale 
 R
 
 162 NOTES. 
 
 molto ricco di Santo Angelo, ma ne anchc, oho gli fossero 
 amicissimi, e congiuntissimi, c alcuni di lore, come furono 
 i Cardinal! di Capua, e di Modana stati utilissimi, e h'da- 
 tissimi ministri. 
 
 Narrasi adimque, que avendo il Valentino mandati 
 inanzi certi fiaschi di vino infetti di veleno, e avendogli 
 falti consegnare a un ministro non consapevole dela cosa, 
 con commissione che non gli desse ad alcuno, sopprav- 
 venne per sorte il Ponteficc inanzi all'ora della cena, e 
 vinto dalla sete, e dai caldi smisnrati che erano, dimando 
 gli fosse dato da bere, ma perche non erano arrivate ancora 
 di palazzo le provisioui per la cena, gli fu da quel ministro, 
 che crcdeva riservarsi come vino piil prezioso, dato da berc 
 del vino, che aveva mandato inanzi Valentino, il quale 
 mentre il padre becva, sopragguigncndo si messe simil- 
 mente a bere del medesimo vino. 
 
 Concorse al corpo morto d'Alessandro in San Piero con 
 incredibilc allegrezza tutta Roma, non potendo saziarsi 
 gli occhi di alcuno di vcdere spento un serpente, che con 
 la sua immoderata ambizione e pestifera perfidia, e con 
 tutti gli esempj di orribile crudeltii, di mostruosa libidine, 
 e d'inaudita avarizia, vendendo senza distinzione le cose 
 sacre, e le profane, avcva attossicato tutto il mondo ; e 
 nondimeno era stato esaltato con rarissima, e quasi 
 perpetua prosperita dalla prima gioventu insino all'ul- 
 tinio della vita sua, desiderundo sempre cose grandis- 
 sime, e ottenendo phi di quello desiderava : csempio 
 potente a confondere I'arroganza di coloro, i quali prc- 
 sumcndosi di scorgere con la debole/za degli occhi 
 umani la profondita dei giudicj diviui, aflermano cio
 
 NOTES. 163 
 
 che di prospero, o d'avverso avvieuc agli uoniini. pro- 
 cedere, o dai meriti, o dai demeriti loro, come se tutto 
 di non apparisse molti buoui essere vessati ingiustamente, 
 e molti di pravo animo essere esaltati indebitamente ; 
 come se, o altrimenti interpretand'o, si derogasse alia guis- 
 tizia, e alia potenza di Dio, 1'amplitudine della quale nou 
 ristretta a termini brevi, e presenti, in altro tempo e in 
 altro Inogo con larga mano con premj, e con supplicj sem- 
 piterni riconosce i giusti dagl' ingiusti. 
 
 Notwithstanding the above account of Guicciardini, 
 it is said by other Italian writers and assented to by Paul 
 Jovius in the second book of his life of Gonsalvo, that the 
 Butler inadvertently happened to misplace the flasks of 
 wine at table, and not before supper as above related and 
 therefore it would appear that the butler was aware of the 
 crime he was committing, Jovius also adds that the poi- 
 son used by Alexander to destroy the lives of others, and 
 by which his own was also destroyed, was a powder ex- 
 ceedingly white, and of a taste not altogether disagreeable, 
 but which immediately entered the veins and by degrees, 
 pian piano, diffused its mortal effects over the whole system. 
 Pope Alexander VI died 18 August 1503, in the 71st year 
 of his age and in the 12th of his Pontificate. He was buried 
 in the Vatican in a common brick tomb. 
 
 Adrian was a native of Cornetto in Tuscany. Innocent 
 VIII sent him as nuncio into Scotland and France ; he was 
 Clerk and Treasurer of the apostolic chamber, and also 
 Secretary to Pope Alexander VI, by whom he was honored 
 with the Cardinal's hat. His life was a continued scene 
 of odd incidents. After his escape from the treachery of
 
 164 NOTES. 
 
 Alexander, he incurred the hatred of Julius II, so that he 
 was obliged to hide himself in the mountains of Trent. 
 Having been recalled by Leo X he was so ungrateful, that 
 he engaged in a conspiracy against him ; which Leo de- 
 tecting, Adrian was amerced in a fine of 12,500 ducats, 
 and forbidden to quit the papal territory. This order, 
 however, he disobeyed, and all his ecclesiastical honours 
 and preferments were, in consequence, taken from him by 
 public sentence. Whither he fled has never been with 
 certainty ascertained. He was one of the first that effectu- 
 ally reformed the Latin style. He studied Cicero with 
 great success, and made many excellent observations on 
 the Roman tongue, in his treatise De Scrmone Latino. He 
 had began a Latin translation of the Old Testament : and 
 wrote a treatise de vera philosophic,, which was printed at 
 Cologne, in 1548. 
 
 NOTE 27, PAGE 45. 
 
 Fuit homo, missus a Dio, eui iwmen crat Johannes. There 
 was a man sent from God whose name was John. 
 
 NOTE 28, PAGE 45. 
 
 VINCENTI aabo manna absconditum, ct nomen novum. I 
 will give hidden mauna and v a new name to the conqueror.
 
 NOTES. 165 
 
 NOTE 29, PAGE 4G. . 
 
 Pravileffia, non privikgia, by bad law : not by private 
 law, or privilege. 
 
 NOTE 30, PAGE 47. 
 
 Pontifex Coliynii necem probat. The Pope el 'Cologne 
 approves the death, of C 
 
 NOTE 31, PAGE 48. 
 
 Blessed be God that the King has fulfilled to me his word. 
 Probably this had reference to 2 Chron. vi. 4. 
 
 NOTE 32, PAGE 50. 
 Uniffenitus and Auctorem Jtdei. 
 
 These are the two well-known bulls beginning with 
 those words. A particular history of the bull unigenitus 
 d&i Filtus, $c. will be found in the history of the Jansenists.
 
 1 66 NOTES. 
 
 NOTE 33, PAGE 51. 
 
 Lorenzo Vala. Laurentius Valla, a man of considerable 
 eminence in his time, was bom at Rome, 1407. He re- 
 trenched the latin language of its gothic barbarisms. He 
 wrote many valuable and learned works. One of his 
 earliest and best was De Elegantii Linguae Latins?. He 
 was apprehended and condemned to be burnt for heresy, 
 but was saved by Alphonsus, king of Naples, after which 
 Pope Nicholas V. called him to Rome, and gave him a 
 pension. He died, according to some biographers, in 1457, 
 but others say 1435. 
 
 NOTE 34, PAGE 51. 
 
 Lewis Antonio Muratori, a learned Italian antiquary, 
 and one of the most voluminous writers of his age and 
 country, was born at Vignoles, in the Duchy of Modcna, 
 in 1672. He early discovered a fondness for the languages 
 and sciences. Having completed his studies, he became 
 an ecclesiastic ; but devoted his time to literature, philo- 
 sophy, theology, civil law, antiquities, &c. In 1694, he 
 was made librarian of the Ambrosian library at Milan : 
 and in 1700, the Duke of Modena made him his librarian, 
 keeper of the archives, and Provost of Santa Maria del 
 Pomposa. He acquired the esteem of the learned through- 
 out Europe, and became an associate of the academies of 
 the Arcades of Rome, Delia Crusca, and Colomberia, of 
 Florence, of Etrusca at Cortona, of the Imperial Academy 
 of Olmutz, and F. R. S. of London. He died in 175' .
 
 NOTES. 1G7 
 
 NOTE 35, PAGE 53. 
 
 Tlie apostle, Jwwever, left him very coolly, merely answer- 
 ing that he had never dispatched any courier. 
 
 Pepin was the first king of the second race of French 
 monarchs ; the Pope styled him a new Moses, a second 
 David ; and it was, perhaps to recompense the clergy for 
 their submission that he granted them great influence in 
 the national assemblies. He died in 768, aged fifty -four. 
 
 This passage of the author affords an instance of that 
 conciseness with wlu'ch Spanish writers so felicitously 
 convey their ideas. There are many of such passages 
 in this work. The rebuke intended to be conveyed by 
 St. Peter to the inquirer as to the letter's authenticity is 
 this : Pepin was not born until about seven hundred 
 years after my decease, and as I am quite sure that I 
 never sent any correspondence from heaven, judge ye, 
 whether or not the letter in question can be mine ; and if 
 this test be not sufficient, just compare it with those two 
 in the Bible. 
 
 NOTE 36, PAGE 53. 
 
 In casna domini. In the Lord's supper. The bull com- 
 mencing with these words. 
 
 NOTE 37, PAGE 54. 
 Antoniu-s Palearius de Verli. A man of great probity,
 
 1GS NOTES. 
 
 and one of the best writers of the sixteenth century, was 
 born at Veroli, in the Campagua di Iloma. lie was pro- 
 fessor of polite literature at Sienna, and afterwards settled 
 at Lucca. Finally, he removed to Milan, where he was 
 seized, carried to Rome, and burnt in 15G6, for having 
 written in favor of the Lutherans, and against the inquisi- 
 tion. He wrote several pieces in verse and in prose, of 
 which a poem on the Immortality of the soul is most 
 esteemed. 
 
 NOTE 38, PAGE 55. 
 
 St. Paul, although lie has not commanded us to burn 
 heretics has told tts to kill tJiem. It is scarcely necessary 
 to say that there is not a tittle of authority for this. Vide 
 Note 42. 
 
 NOTE 39, PAGE 55. 
 
 Ut harcttcos devitemtu. That we should avoid, or shun, 
 heretics. 
 
 NOTE 40, PAGE 55. 
 De vita jn-ivemw. Let us deprive them of life. 
 
 NOTE 41, PAGE 56. 
 Secundum i/ttcrprctationcm sanctissimi domini nostri
 
 NOTES. lf)9 
 
 Papce. According to the interpretation of our most holy 
 lord the Pope, 
 
 NOTE 42, PAGE 56. 
 
 Et hos devita. And shun these. 1 Tim. vi. 11. 
 The words in the original are Tctvln ywyc, flee these 
 things, which by no tortuosity of meaning can possibly 
 be twisted into any reference to the destruction of life, but 
 the Latin word fovita, which is a translation of yivyi, may, 
 by being separated into two words de vita, have a reference 
 to putting to death, If we keep to the original Greek 
 there is no doubt at all about the sense, but if that WTetched 
 translation called the Vulgate is to be referred to, I would 
 end this note by an extract from Jeremy Taylor's " Liberty 
 of Propliesying" title, " Difficulty of Expounding Scrip- 
 ture," p. 112. " And now what help is there for us in the 
 " midst of these uncertainties ? If we follow any one 
 " translation, or any one man's commentary, what rule 
 " shall we have to choose the right by ? Or is there any one 
 " man, that hath translated perfectly, or expounded infal- 
 " libly ? No translation challenges such a prerogative as 
 " to be authentic, but the vulgar Latin ; and yet see with 
 " what good success : for when it was declared authentic 
 " by the Council of Trent, Sixtus put forth a copy much 
 " mended of what it was, and tied all men to follow that ; 
 " but that did not satisfy ; for Pope Clement reviews and 
 " corrects it in many places, and still the decree remains 
 "in a changed subject. And secondly, that translation 
 " will be very unapt to satisfy, in which one of their own 
 " men, Isidore Clarius, a monk of Brescia, found and 
 S
 
 170 NOTES. 
 
 " mended eight thousand faults, besides innumerable others 
 " which he Bays he pretermitted." 
 
 NOTE 43, PAGE 58. 
 
 Cardinal Balcrmino. Robert Bellarmin, an Italian 
 Jesuit, one of the most celebrated controversial writers of 
 his time, was born in Tuscany, 1542. He died in 1621. 
 
 In 1576 he read lectures at Rome with such applause, 
 that Sixtus V, sending a legate into France in 1590, ap- 
 pointed him as an attendant divine, in case any dispute 
 should arise in matters of religion. 
 
 He returned to Rome, and was raised successively to 
 different offices, till at last, in 1599, he was honored with 
 a Cardinal's Hat ; his acceptance of which, it is said, they 
 were obliged to force, by threatening him with an ana- 
 thema, in case of refusal. It is certain that no Jesuit ever 
 did greater honor to his order, and that no author ever so 
 well defended the Romish Church. Protestants have 
 owned this; for, during the space of fifty years, there was 
 scarcely any considerable divine among them, who did not 
 fix upon this author for the subject of his books and con- 
 troversy. 
 
 Notwithstanding the zeal with which he maintained the 
 power of the Pope over the temporality of kings, he dis- 
 pleased Sixtus V. in his work, De Romano pontifice, by 
 insisting that the power which Jesus Christ gave to his 
 vicegerent was only indirect, and had the mortification to
 
 NOTES. 171 
 
 see it put into the index of the Inquisition, though it was 
 afterwards removed. 
 
 He died in 1621, leaving one half of his soul to the 
 Virgin Mary, and the other to Jesus Christ. 
 
 NOTE 44, PAGE 59. 
 
 Donee confusibiliter sit combustus. Until he shall be 
 burnt into a state of confusedness. 
 
 NOTE 45, PAGE 60. 
 
 Non attento qitod vohierint stare Judicio aut rationem 
 reddere She heeds not that they should come to judgment 
 or plead. 
 
 NOTE 46, PAGE 60. 
 
 Xon potest ita resistere spirltus sanetus Jwdic, slcut fecit 
 tempore sancti Stephani. The Holy Spirit cannot resist, 
 at present, in the same way aa it did in the time of St. 
 Stephen. 
 
 NOTE 47, PAGE 61. 
 
 Ut occidantur antcquam audiantur. That they should be 
 killed before they are heard.
 
 NOTE 48, PAGE G3. 
 
 Lazarillo A boy who leads a blind beggar is called, in 
 Spain, a Lazarillo. 
 
 NOTE 49, PAGE 64. 
 
 Platina, Bartholomew Sacchi, or Philip Platiua, a 
 learned Italian historian, born in 1421 at Piedena, a village 
 between Cremona and Mantua. He first embraced a 
 military life, but afterwards devoted himself to literature. 
 He went to Rome under Calixtus III, about 1456 ; was 
 introduced to Cardinal Bessarion, obtained some benefices 
 from Pius II. and was appointed apostolical abbreviator. 
 Paul II abolished the offices of all the abbreviators. 
 Platina complained to the Pope, and requested to be 
 judged by the auditors of the Rota. Paul gave him a 
 haughty repulse, and finally put him in prison, where he 
 suffered great hardships for four months, when he was libe- 
 rated, but forbidden to leave Rome. He was afterwards, 
 with many others, imprisoned on suspicion of a plot and 
 put to the rack. The plot being found imaginary he 
 was next accused of heresy. Sixtus IV succeeding Paul 
 in 1467, appointed Platina keeper of the Vatican library, 
 in which station he lived very happily till 1481, when he 
 died of the plague. He was author of several works, of 
 which the most famous is his History of the Popes.
 
 NOTES. 173 
 
 NOTE 50, PAGE 66. 
 
 This sepulchre of Adrian. This is a circular and won- 
 derful mass of building now divested of every ornament ; 
 it \was built by the Emperor Adrian in imitation of the 
 mausoleum of Augustus, on the opposite side of the Tiber, 
 for the piirpose of containing his ashes and those of the 
 Caesars his successors. This sepulchre in the time of 
 Belisarius and Narsetes was made a fortress, and its fine- 
 works were broken to pieces. The ashes of Adrian were 
 placed in the most eminent part of the mausoleum, as also 
 were those of all the Antonines his siiccessors. In the 
 pontificate of Gregory the Great it changed its name, owing 
 to the following events : In the year 593 the plague 
 visited Rome. To appease the wrath of God by the 
 repentance of his people, it is said that the Pope, while 
 carrying in procession the image of the Virgin on Easter 
 Sunday, and on coming near this mole, heard an audible 
 voice proceed from some invisible agent saying Regina 
 cceli laitare, alleluja, to which His Holiness astonished, but 
 full of faith, answered, Ora pro nobis Dcum, alleluja. At 
 tlu's moment the mortal pestilence began to cease its ravages 
 among the people, and in memory of the event, the Pope 
 erected, here, a church in honor of the celestial prince St. 
 Michael the Archangel. Boniface III afterwards erected 
 one on the adjoining mole in consequence of a similar 
 vision with which he had been favored on mount Gargano, 
 in the time of Pope Gelasius ; this, from its commanding 
 situation, was called inter nubes. Subsequently, in honor 
 of the same St. Michael, his statue was placed on the 
 summit, in the act of sheathing the sword, in allusion to the
 
 174 NOTES. 
 
 above circumstance. This fortress was next called the 
 tower of Crescentius. Urban VIII furnished it with 
 cannon and mortars from the metal which was taken from 
 the Pantheon, placed a garrison in it, with a Vicecastellan, 
 and then named it by its present appellation, the castle of 
 St. Angelo. The marble statue of the Archangel -y&s 
 taken down, and otherwise appropriated by Benedict XIV. 
 who placed the present one of cast metal in its stead. In 
 this castle the papal crown is kept, and here state prisoners 
 are confined. Here also the Popes retire for personal 
 security in times of danger. 
 
 NOTE 51, PAGE 66. 
 
 TJut Bull of Phalaris. Phalaris the tyrant of .Agrigen- 
 tum, for whom Perillus, a brass-founder at Athena, made 
 a brazen Bull, in which after he had presented it to 
 Phalaris, that Tyrant ordered the inventor to submit, 
 in his own person, to the first experiment to bo made by 
 it. This Bull was of a size larger than life. It contained, 
 on one side a door to admit the victims, who, being shut 
 up in it and a fire kindled underneath, were roasted to 
 death ; the animal's throat was so contrived as to assimi- 
 late the groans of the dying to the roaring of one of these 
 living animals. It is said that the Tyrant himself, after 
 first having his tongue cut out, was burnt in this Bull. 
 The justice of the experiment on Perillus himself ia 
 beautifully alluded to by Ovid : 
 
 " Nee lex est justior ilia, 
 Quam necis artifices arte pcrirc sui."
 
 NOTES. 17,5 
 
 This sacrifice proposed by Perillus and tried experi- 
 mentally upon himself puts one in mind of Milton's 
 Moloch. 
 
 " Horrid king besmeared with blood 
 Of human sacrifice and parents' tears, 
 Though for the noise of drums and timbrels loud 
 Their children's cries unheard that pass'd through fire 
 To his grim idol." 
 
 PAR. LOST, 392. 
 
 NOTE 52, PAGE 72. 
 
 Sopa boba de las reservas. There is some difficulty in 
 translating these words from the Castillian. Literally, they 
 signify the sweets or the sugar-plums of the reservations. 
 These reservations are numerous and various. They may 
 refer to those private pecuniary supplies which the pope re- 
 ceives from those potentates who carry his yoke, and which 
 supplies, it is pretended, are solemnly set apart to meet 
 the exigencies of the Roman See in calamitous times. 
 Or, they may refer to certain encroachments made by the 
 Popes on the patronage of Kings over that portion of the 
 Roman church more immediately under their protection ; 
 as, for example, the usurped right of appointing certain 
 canons and bishops, a usurpation which has, for centuries, 
 been the bone of contention between the Roman Court 
 and that particular sect of divines called Jansenists.
 
 17G NOTES. 
 
 NOTE 53, PAGE 77- 
 
 Pro redemptions apostolontm. For the redemption of 
 the apostles. 
 
 NOTE 54, PAGE 78. 
 
 Peter Damino or Damaino. An eminent Cardinal, 
 was born at Ravenna, in the beginning of the 16th cen- 
 tury ; died, 1673. 
 
 NOTE 55, PAGE 78. 
 
 Cardinal Zabarcl. Francis Zabarella, a learned Car- 
 dinal, born at Padua in 1339. He became professor of 
 canon law in different universities, and was made a 
 Cardinal by Pope John XXI, who sent him ambassador 
 to the Emperor Sigismund. He assisted at the Council 
 pf Constance, where he advised to depose the pope, whom 
 he accused of forty notorious crimes. He died there in 
 1417, leaving numerous works on Philosphy and on 
 Theology. 
 
 NOTE 56, PAGE 78. 
 
 Cardinal de Cusa. Nicolas de Cusa, famous for his vast 
 knowledge in law and divinity, was born at Cusa, 1401. 
 lie was made a Cardinal in 1448 ; and being appointed
 
 NOTES. 177 
 
 govenor of Rome by Pope Pius II, during his absence at 
 Mantua, he was the chief conductor of the war against the 
 Turks. He founded a church, and a good library of 
 Greek and Latin authors, at Cusa, and left many excellent 
 works behind him, which were collected and published in 
 three volumes at Basil, in 1565. In these he detected and 
 has made no. scruple to expose the traditions and sophistries 
 of the Roman church. He died at Todi, a city of Umbria, 
 1464. 
 
 NOTE 57, PAGE 78. 
 
 Gerson. John Gerson, an illustrious French Divine, 
 sometimes called Charlier, was born at Gerson in France, 
 1363 ; died in a Convent at Lyons, 1429. 
 
 NOTE 58, PAGE 78. 
 
 Nicholas Clemangis. Sometimes called De Clamangis ; 
 was a distinguished divine of the university of Paris of 
 which he was Rector in 1393. He was the author of two 
 curious works entitled " De Lapsce et Reparatione Jus- 
 ticiaj" and "Disputatio" in the thirteenth century. He 
 also published several other works, which so uncompro- 
 misingly reprove the corruptions of the Church of Rome, 
 that they were republished by Lydius, a protestant minis- 
 ter in Holland, in 1613. One of them is entitled, " Of 
 the corrupt state of the Church." His style was superior 
 to the general taste of the age in which he lived. 
 T
 
 178 NOTES. 
 
 NOTE 59, PAGE 79. 
 
 T/iose fishhooks of lead. In order to the validity of all 
 dispensations and other official papal documents, the arms 
 of the Pope area necessary adjunct, like the frogs of Maece- 
 nas, and are always stamped on pieces of lead. 
 
 NOTE 60, PAGE 81. 
 
 The Jesuit Palacivini. Sforza Pallavicini, a learned 
 cardinal, bom at Rome in 1607. He became a Jesuit in 
 1638. He was much employed by Popes Innocent X and 
 Alexander VII. He wrote several works, the chief of 
 which was a History of the Council of Trent, wherein he 
 opposes that of Father Paul. 
 
 NOTE 61, PAGE 81. 
 
 Father Laincz* -James Laincz, a Spaniard, companion 
 of Ignatius Loyola the founder of die religious order of 
 the llomish church called Jesuits. Lainez was second 
 general of that, order : he induced the Pope, Paul IV, to 
 ratify the following privileges: 1. The right of making all 
 sorts of contracts (without the privity of the community) 
 vested in the generals and their delegates. 2. That of giv- 
 ing authenticity to all comments and explanations of their 
 constitutions. 3. The power of making new, andaltcring the
 
 NOTES 179 
 
 old constitutions; this opened the door to their bloody 
 political tenets, which are not to be attributed to Loyola. 
 4. That of having prisons independent of the secular 
 authority, in which they put to death refractory brethren . 
 I>ainez died in 1565, aged 53. 
 
 NOTE 6*2, PAGE 82; 
 Operarios. The friars who assist sick or dying persons. 
 
 NOTE 63, PAGE 85. 
 
 Desinant hceretici OPES romanis pontiflcibus vitio vartcre. 
 Let heretics cease to turn to a reproach the wealth of the 
 Roman Pontiffs. 
 
 NOTE 64, PAGE 86. 
 
 Pro sustinwulo statum citrice et capitis. For the purpose 
 of maintaining the state of the court and head. 
 
 NOTE 65, PAGE 88. 
 
 Polybius. A celebrated Greek historian, whose accuracy 
 and fidelity rendered his history a work of great importance. 
 He was born at Megalopolis a city of Arcadia, about 203 
 years before Christ. He was the son of Lyeortas, chief of 
 the republic of the Achoeans, and trained to arms under
 
 180 NOTES. 
 
 ihc famous Philopccmcn, whose urn he carriel in the 
 funeral procession of that general. He died at the age 
 
 of 82. 
 
 NOTE 66, PAGE 92. 
 
 Cornelius Agrippa. Henry Cornelius Agrippa, a man 
 of considerable learning, and reputed an eminent magi- 
 cian ; for the monks of his time suspected every tiling to 
 be heresy or sorcery which they did not understand. He 
 was born at Cologne, I486; and died at Grenoble, in 1535. 
 His works have been uncommonly popular. 
 
 NOTE 67, PAGE 92. 
 
 A Julio. A Roman silver coin of the value of about 
 six shillings and two pence English. 
 
 NOTB 68, PAGB 93. 
 
 Twenty thousand ducats. The old ducat of Venice, with 
 the words " Ducatus Venetus " upon it, was worth about 
 two pounds and sixpence. The ducat of Florence and 
 Leghorn however, Avas worth ten juliosand ahalf or some- 
 thing more than three pounds four shllings and sixpence. 
 Taking this to be the value of the ducats referred to in the 
 text, the tax in question would amount to about 64,500J.
 
 NOTES. 181 
 
 NOTE 69, PAGE 95. 
 
 Akahuetes. This word is to be understood in both the 
 masculine and feminine genders. 
 
 NOTE 70, PAGE 95. 
 
 Datary or Datario Apostolico, is a public building situ- 
 ated on a hill anciently called Clivus Salutaris, erected by 
 Urban VIII which contains offices for the registration of 
 investitures ofbcncfices and ecclesiastical dignities, together 
 with accommodations for some of its ministers and officers. 
 Here also are prepared, filed, and registered the bulls, dis- 
 pensations, orders, and such like commodities of the Jwly 
 See. 
 
 NOTE 71, PAGE 96. 
 Five thousand marks of silver. About 3,300/. sterling. 
 
 NOTE 72, PAGE 96. 
 
 Savonarola. Jerome Savonarola, a famous Italian 
 Monk celebrated for his eloquence and his melancholy 
 fate. He was born at Ferrara in 1452, and was designed 
 for the medical profession. At the age of fourteen he left 
 the parental abode, and entered the order of Dominicans.
 
 182 NOTES. 
 
 Some years afterwards he commenced hi pastoral la- 
 bours at Florence but with BO little effect that he resolved 
 on leaving the pulpit, and retiring to Bologna, where he 
 devoted himself to physical and metaphysical studies. 
 
 His great reputation and talents induced Lorenzo de 
 Medici to invite him to return to Florence. 
 
 Savonarola here re-commenced preaching, and so at- 
 tractive were his discouses, that the church was unable to 
 contain the crowds of people who came to hear him. 
 
 His sanctity and eloquence gave him great ascendancy 
 over the minds of the Florentines, and he was led to the 
 assumption of a prophetic manner of address and to urge 
 with great vehemence the absolute necessity of a reform in 
 the church. 
 
 After the death of his Patron Lorenzo, and the expulsion 
 of his son Pietro, Savonarola took the most active part in 
 the political affairs of Florence. He put himself at the 
 head of those who demanded a more democratical form of 
 government, asserted that God had commissioned him to 
 declare that the legislative power must be extended to the 
 citizens, that he himself had been the Ambassador of the 
 Florentines to heaven, and that Christ had consented to be 
 their King. The newly elected magistrates accordingly laid 
 down their offices, and the legislative functions were en- 
 trusted to a council of the citizens, which chose a com- 
 mittee from their own number for the discharge of the 
 duty. Dissensions, however, distracted the new republic ; 
 tlie aristocratical and democratical parties persecuted each
 
 NOTES. 183 
 
 other with great ftiry, the former consisting of the friends 
 of the old order of things, and the latter of the devout ad- 
 mirers of the monk. But the zeal of Savonarola was not 
 content with revolutionizing Florence, he meditated the 
 reform of the Roman Court, and of the irregularities of the 
 clergy. The pontificate of Alexander VI, could not fail to 
 supply causes of complaint on both heads. He accordingly 
 wrote, as his eulogists inform us, to the Christian princes, 
 declaring that the church was going to ruin, and that it 
 was their duty to convoke a general council, before which 
 he was ready to prove that the church was without a 
 head, and that the reigning Pope was not a true 
 bishop, had never been worthy of the title, nor even 
 the name of a Christian. Alexander excommunicated 
 him, and the bull of excommunication was read in 
 the cathedral at Florence, but Savonarola despised the 
 thunders of the Vatican, and continued to preach. His 
 influence was further increased by the failure of an attempt 
 cf Pietro de Medici to restore his family authority. But 
 another party had, meanwhile, arisen in opposition to him. 
 His innovations in St. Mark's and other monasteries had 
 excited the enmity of the monks, especially of the Fran- 
 ciscans of the strict observance, who denounced him from 
 the pulpit as an excommunicated heretic. Fra Domenico 
 da Rescia, a monk of his convent, offered, in the heat of 
 his fanatical zeal, to prove the truth of his master's doctrines 
 by passing through fire, if one of his opponents would 
 undergo the same ordeal in defence of their opinions. The 
 challenge was accepted by a Franciscan monk, and Savo- 
 narola, with his champion, appeared at the head of a large 
 procession, chanting Psalm Ixviii. " Let God arise, and 
 let his enemies be scattered." The Franciscan also pre-
 
 184 NOTES. 
 
 sented himself, the fire was kindled, and Doinenico was 
 ready to enter the flames bearing the host in his hands- 
 But the crowd exclaimed against this sacrilege, as they 
 termed it ; and, as Domenico persisted in his determination, 
 he thus happily escaped the ordeal for which he had 
 offered himself. But this event was fatal to Savonarola. 
 The people loaded him with insults, and he was finally 
 thrown into prison. A spiritual court, under the direction 
 of two papal commissioners, was held for his trial. His 
 firmness and eloquence at first threw his judges into con-, 
 fusion, but being examined on the rack, he confessed that 
 he had falsely arrogated supernatural powers. He was 
 condemned, with some of his adherents to be first strang- 
 led, and then burnt, and the sentence was executed on 
 the 23rd of May, 1498, in presence of a large multitude. 
 
 NOTE 73, PAGE 98. 
 
 Miserere mci Deus. Have Mercy upon me, O God, &c. 
 Psalm li. 
 
 NOTE 74, PAGE 99. 
 ft 
 
 Quattrini. Money. 
 
 NOTE 75, PAGE 100. 
 
 Veronica. According to the tradition of the llomish 
 Church, a lady called Veronica met our Saviour in the
 
 NOTES. 185 
 
 street of Amargura in Jerusalem, bearing his cross on the 
 way to Mount Calvary ; and perceiving the perspiration 
 running down his face, she offered the use of her handker- 
 chief, which our Lord is said to have used, or to have 
 permitted Veronica to use, in wiping the sweat from his 
 temples. In performing this operation the handkerchief 
 happened to be folded into double, treble, or quadruple, 
 and it was found that an exact impress of the Saviour's 
 visage was indelibly stamped on every fold ! These por- 
 traits, they say, have been preserved and are certainly 
 venerated as sacred relics in different places. One is 
 exhibited in Rome, another in Padua, and a third in Jaen, 
 in Andalusia. A public exhibition of this holy face is 
 permitted annually on a certain day appointed for the 
 purpose, when a plenary indulgence is granted to all who 
 go to look upon it, to confess, and to receive the holy 
 communion. 
 
 It is only the most ignorant and superstitious who are 
 found to believe in tliis fable : indeed it has now become 
 proverbial with a Spaniard when told of any tiling that 
 seems impossible, to say, Eso y la carra de Dios esta en 
 Jaen. This, and the face of God, is in Jaen. 
 
 The tradition further says, that for tliis acceptable ser- 
 vice rendered by Veronica, who accompanied our Lord to 
 Calvary, and was one of the women found weeping at the 
 foot of the cross, the Saviour was pleased to convert her 
 and afterwards to receive her into glory. 
 U
 
 18G NOTES. 
 
 I have taken some pains in searching for an authentic 
 account of this lady, but regret that the result induces me 
 to conclude this note with the following well known 
 Spanish stanza. 
 
 " El mentir de las estrellas, 
 
 " Se llama bello mentir, 
 
 " Porque nadie ha de ir 
 " A preguntarselo a ellas." 
 
 NOTE 76, PAGE 104. 
 
 Anthong Arnauld. Advocate General to Catherine de 
 Medicis, was born at Paris, about 1550; died 1619. 
 
 NOTE 77, PAGE 104. 
 
 Rocaberti. A zealous defender of Papal Authority, was 
 born at Peselada, on the Frontiers of Roussillon and Cata- 
 lonia, about 1624 ; he died in 1699. Among his other 
 works is the Bibliotheca Pontificia, a large collection of 
 treatises in favor of the Pope's authority and infallibility, 
 published in Rome in 21 vols. folio, in 1700. 
 
 NOTE 78, PAGE 104. 
 
 Ayuirre. Joseph Saenz de Aguirre, a very learned man 
 of the seventeenth century ; was born at Logrono, in 
 Spain, 1630. In 1683 he published a voluminous work
 
 NOTES. 187 
 
 against the Declaration of the Assembly of the French 
 Clergy, made in 1682, under the title of " A Defence of 
 the See of St. Peter." But the work by which he is more 
 particularly known, is his Collection of the Councils of 
 Spain, and of the New Hemisphere, with an Introductory 
 History. This was published in 1693 4, in 4 vols. fol. 
 An octavo Prodromus of it had been printed at Salam, in 
 1686. 
 
 NOTE 79, PAGE 106. 
 
 Nicholas Gurtler, the Historian of the Templars. A 
 learned Protestant Divine, was born at Bazil 1654, and 
 died 1711. 
 
 NOTE 80, PAGE 108. 
 In iUo tempore. At that time. 
 
 NOTE 81, PAGE 116. 
 
 Ob solam dominandi libidinem. Only for the lust of 
 domination. 
 
 NOTE 82, PAGE 117. 
 
 Urbis et orbis. Of the city, i.e. Rome, and of the 
 world. Who does not recognize in this, something of 
 modern socialism ?
 
 188 NOTES. 
 
 NOTE 83, PAGE 120. 
 
 The simple ones who give gold for lead. See Note 59. 
 
 NOTE 84, PAGE 128. 
 Regum similes. Equal to kings. 
 
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