I Also Adjure Thee, O Lord, By Those Three Blessed
Crosses, By Those Three Blessed Chalices, By Those Three Blessed
Clergymen, by those three consecrated hosts, that thou give me that
sweet company which thou gavest to the Virgin Maria,
From the gates
of Bethlehem to the portals of Jerusalem, that I may go and come
with pleasure and joy with Jesus Christ, the Son of the Virgin
Maria, the prolific yet nevertheless the eternal virgin."
The woman of the house and her daughter had similar bags attached
to their necks, containing charms, which, they said, prevented the
witches having power to harm them. The belief in witchcraft is
very prevalent amongst the peasantry of the Alemtejo, and I believe
of other provinces of Portugal. This is one of the relies of the
monkish system, the aim of which, in all countries where it has
existed, seems to have been to beset the minds of the people, that
they might be more easily misled. All these charms were
fabrications of the monks, who had sold them to their infatuated
confessants. The monks of the Greek and Syrian churches likewise
deal in this ware, which they know to be poison, but which they
would rather vend than the wholesome balm of the gospel, because it
brings them a large price, and fosters the delusion which enables
them to live a life of luxury.
The Sunday morning was fine, and the plain before the church of the
convent of San Francisco was crowded with people hastening to or
returning from the mass. After having performed my morning
devotion, and breakfasted, I went down to the kitchen; the girl
Geronima was seated by the fire. I inquired if she had heard mass?
She replied in the negative, and that she did not intend to hear
it. Upon my inquiring her motive for absenting herself, she
replied, that since the friars had been expelled from their
churches and convents she had ceased to attend mass, or to confess
herself; for that the government priests had no spiritual power,
and consequently she never troubled them. She said the friars were
holy men and charitable; for that every morning those of the
convent over the way fed forty poor persons with the relics of the
meals of the preceding day, but that now these people were allowed
to starve. I replied, that the friars, who lived on the fat of the
land, could well afford to bestow a few bones upon their poor, and
that their doing so was merely a part of their policy, by which
they hoped to secure to themselves friends in time of need. The
girl then observed, that as it was Sunday, I should perhaps like to
see some books, and without waiting for a reply she produced them.
They consisted principally of popular stories, with lives and
miracles of saints, but amongst them was a translation of Volney's
Ruins of Empires. I expressed a wish to know how she became
possessed of this book.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 28 of 424
Words from 14267 to 14770
of 222596
