between the heretics and the champions of the Church. The little interest taken by the Troubadours in the doctrinal aspect of the case may account for this paucity of documents.1 A great number of heretical writings have undoubtedly been destroyed by the intolerant rage of monks and inquisitors, but it is by no means certain that many, or indeed any, of these were written by, or in the language of, the Troubadours. If so, one cannot but wonder why the violent attacks on the moral depravity of the clergy, with which Provençal literature is teeming, should have escaped the same fate.

The poem I am speaking of certainly leaves nothing to be desired as regards orthodoxy. It is written by Izarn, a monk, and a more striking specimen of monkish effrontery would be looked for in vain in any literature. So grotesque indeed is the cynicism displayed, that one almost suspects an ironical sceptic cleverly disguised in the mask of the zealot; but there are other features of the poemlittle touches, for instance, of vanity and unctuous selflaudation-which place the author's real purpose beyond a doubt. The 'Novas del Heretge,' or

Tale of the Heretic,' is written in the form of a dialogue between the author and one Sicart de Figueiras, apparently an important member, or, as he calls himself, a 'bishop,' of the Albigeois sect.

The religious poems of the Vaudois, especially the celebrated 'Noble Lesson,' a medley of moral and dogmatic precepts, do not concern us, they being both by language and tendency entirely removed from the sphere of artistic literature.

The opening lines are important to the historian of theology. They prove that the Neo-Manichean heretics believed, or at least were said by the Catholics to believe, in something very like metempsychosis. 'Tell me,' the monk begins, in what school you have learned that the spirit of man, when it has lost its body, enters an ox, an ass, or a horned wether, a hog or a hen, whichever it sees first, and migrates from one to the other until a new body of man or woman is born for it? . . . This thou hast taught to deluded people whom thou hast given to the devil and taken away from God. May every place and every land that has supported thee perish!' This style of spiritual vituperation was likely to prove but too effective, being as it was enforced by very material means of coercion. For the conversation, as we gather from the next-following lines, takes place in one of the prisons of the sacred tribunal. • The fire is alight,' Izarn continues; 'the people are · assembled to see justice done, and if you refuse to confess you will certainly be burnt.' Motives of much less force would be sufficient to overcome the resistance of the worthy Sicart. His conscientious scruples are indeed of the very slightest description; he is anxious only about the terms of his capitulation. 'Izarn,' he says, 'if you assure me and give securities that I shall not be burnt or immured or otherwise destroyed, I don't care what other punishment you may inflict; only save me from that.' But he knows his captors too well to expect his life from motives of pity. Treachery is the price of his

safety, and of that commodity he offers liberal measure. 'Berit,' he says, 'and Peire Razol' (two other spies, it may be conjectured) 'don't know half of what I do. do. I will tell you everything you ask both about believers and heretics, but you must promise me secrecy.' Next follows a somewhat rambling explanation of the cause of his desertion, in which the souls of five hundred people whom he claims to have rescued from eternal perdition play a principal part. But he is particularly anxious to impress upon the monk that poverty has not been the motive of his action. First of all,' he says, 'I want you to know that I have not presented myself to you owing to hunger or thirst, or from any need whatsoever; pray be aware of that.'

The meaning of all this is that he wants to point out, as indeed he does afterwards in so many words, how valuable an acquisition he would be, and how glad the Church of Rome ought to be to receive him on terms however favourable. This seems reasonable enough, but the matter appears in a very different light when he begins to describe with glowing colours the treasures which his confidential position amongst the heretics has placed at his disposal. An account of the easy and luxurious life he led amongst the heretics is evidently inserted with a view to disparage and expose as hypocritical pretence the appearance of rigorous morality assumed, and in most cases no doubt justly assumed, by the elders of the dissenting churches. But all these comforts and enjoyments, Sicart declares, he has for

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saken for the call of Heaven, interpreted to him by the eloquent voice of that chosen vessel, Izarn—the author, that is. The complacency with which the monk by the mouth of his convert pays a compliment to his own theological sagacity, mentioning especially nine questions' which have completely baffled the heretic, and not omitting at the same time an incidental reference to his poetical gift, is as amusing as it is characteristic. It furnishes, moreover, the best proof against the suspicion of a hidden satirical purpose, which the tone of the poem may have excited in the reader's mind. The subtlest humorist could not artificially reproduce the naïve genuineness of this self-praise. No wonder that, convinced by such excellent argument, Sicart is willing to atone for former errors by the merciless persecution of his late friends and co-religionists. 'Not twopennyworth of love or peace shall they find at my hands,' he savagely exclaims, promising at the same time to betray to the Inquisition the most secret places where they and their treasures are hidden-all sentiments highly and unctuously approved of by the excellent Izarn, it need scarcely be added.

No more barefaced disclosure of the vilest motives of the human heart can well be imagined than is to be found in this poem. 'Mr. Sludge the medium' himself would hesitate before entering into competition with the worthy monk and his no less desirable convert. If the utterly demoralising influence of religious persecution on both persecutors

and at least the weaker part of their victims needed further proof in our days, this poem might be held up as a warning example.

It is perhaps hardly fair to mention together with such a production other works by monkish authors sometimes replete with simple-minded piety and never without the quaint charm of mediæval narrative. Such are the paraphrases of Biblical and other religious legends of which Provençal literature shows a goodly array. None of them, however, calls for detailed notice, their character showing no essential deviation from similar works in other languages, and their subject and treatment being widely remote from the artistic poetry with which this book is chiefly concerned. Suffice it to mention the names of some of the saints chosen for treatment, such as St. Alexius, St. Honorat, and Sta. Fides, (the MS. of the last-mentioned legend dating, according to Fauchet, as far back as the eleventh century), also rhymed paraphrases of the apocryphal gospels of 'St. Nicodemus,' and the 'Infancy of Christ.'

Of much greater importance than any of these is a semi-religious didactic poem treating of that favourite hero of the pseudo-historic Muse in the middle ages, Boethius, and the spiritual comfort he derived in his worldly misfortune from what Shakespeare, perhaps with a faint reminiscence of this very man, calls adversity's sweet milk philosophy.' The goddess of that divine science appears to Boethius, 'Count of Rome,' in prison, to which he has been