must needs be great because double that of her new Love being augmented by that of the hatred she bore to the unjust rigours and real deformities of her husband and the furious appetite she had for a revenge for his outrages which at last brought her to this resolution After the expence of many a Tear Which daily flowed from her Eyes If Heaven refuse her Plaints to hear She 'll call Hell to her Enterprize But Heaven is too just to authorize such execrable Designs as render the ensuing Lines more black by the wickendess they relate than the Ink that forms them enough to strike a horror into Hell to see Crimes invented by Female subtilty which it can readily punish but never invent Such Crimes proceeding from unlawfull Love To which Medea's would but slight ones prove But for the present what could she do for to die every day a thousand tormenting deaths in the sight of the Remedy that was only able to cure her to die unrevenged and without complaining to him that is the cause what is this but to put a Needle betwixt two Load-stones and cause that contrary to Nature he that she rejects in her Soul should possess her Body and that he to whom her very Heart and Inclinations bend cannot be informed of her thoughts So that she must either evaporate this wind or suffer an Earth-quake to shake her very Soul she must either spring this Mine or be buried in it but the way must be to do it with that kind of Powder which destroys without Report Were I not desirous to find in the Viper and Scorpion the Antidote against their own Poyson I should here close up this rugged Clew I am about to follow or if I continued in it I should desire the Reader here to close his Eyes for fear of defiling them with the reading the most execrable Actions which humane Invention could produce but I hope the great heavenly Physitian will assist me so artificially to compound my Medicine that the Antidote may furmount the Poyson For in pursuing this Discourse I to my self propose this end That he who reads may feel remorse From that by which he learns t' offend Thus the Rays of the Sun pass upon the Dung-hill without infection and a sound Judgment through the knowledg of Evil without receiving the least Tincture I fear not but to draw Light from this Darkness and sacred Fire as the Children of Israel at their return from Babylon out of a Pit fill'd with Ordure And who can blame for unfit or unprofitable the History of the Great Whore in the Apocalyps Since God proposeth those Examples for us by seeing the Punishments to avoid the Crimes and oft for notorious Offences he useth extraordinary Punishments as in Thunder the sound affrights all but the Bolt lights but upon few And God has also Commanded his Prophets to declare unto his People their Crimes and Offences and spit their shameful Actions in their Faces to Preach upon the Roofs what is practised in the Chambers and to bring into the Evidence of Light that which hath been acted in the Cover of Darkness And the Prophet has said to an Idolatrous People I will discover thy nakedness to the Nations With this Intention I enter into the blackest Labyrinth imaginable and into a Recital more horrible than the Abomination of Desolation the Crimes of which are as worthy of detestation as of punishment The End of the First Book ALCIMUS AND VANNOZA LIB II. IT cannot be denied that those Crimes are greatest in which God who ought to be the Punisher is made a Party and when the Sinner endeavours to make him a Servant to Iniquity when Godliness serves for a veil to Impiety this Wickedness may well be termed deplorable 'T was here that the detestable Vannoza began to warp her Web and like the Silk-worm digged her Tomb where she thought to build a House She was now feignedly become extream devout which infinitely pleased her Husband who not being able to judge but by the out-side imagined that her Honour was now fenced with a double Rampart since the Exercises of Devotion would serve for a pleasing entertainment in her solitude and that the fear and love of God taking up her thoughts would breed in her a horrour of sin and a detestation of all other than lawful affections resembling the Mother of Pearl which in the middle of the salt waves of the Sea receives no other moisture than what proceeds from from the Dew He could not refrain his praises of her and extraordinary applauses to testifie his joy to see her mix together her devotion towards God and her duty towards him See here a Husband become a Preacher a good Husband certainly far more careful and curious of the Conscience of his fair Companion than of his own Admirable Charity Capoleon became the Trumpet of his Wives Devotion he thought her imploy'd in her private Closet in the Gallery in the same Exercises with the Valiant Bethulian Widow believing that her Contemplations were wholly upon Heavenly Objects which were continually fixed upon an earthly one whilst he managed his Horse in the Street Vannoza seeing that her Train had taken sire and that her Husband accounted her very devout ceased not to beat this Iron whilst it was hot holding him in Discourses of Piety and Heaven though both as far distant from her heart as the later is from the Earth even unto Visions and Revelations sometimes intermingling Sighs and Exclamations with turning of her eyes almost in a feigned extasie speaking nothing but of hair-Cloaths and Mortification heaping up abundance of Images and Books of Devotion recounting pieces of Sermons which she retained in her Memoty and some Tracts of the Lives of Saints which so ravished the spirit of the old Man that he could not take her for less than a Saint and termed her his Tutelary Angel who inwardly accounted him her Guardian-Devil Devil Nothing so much pleaseth the old Husband of a young Wife as to see her piously inclined imagining that she will there find such satisfactions of spirit that she will never esteem those of the flesh Thus Capoleon thought that this design in him of imprisoning his Wife proceeded from Divine Inspiration God having used that means to accomplish so good a Work He begun to have more considence in her and to testifie by some more than ordinary Caresses that she should never want his affections in recompence of those she had fixed upon God and that his love should still increase towards her as hers did towards Heaven After this she made her pious retreats last somewhat longer but this was more to watch the passage of him who was the light of her eyes than to content her spirit with Celestial Raptures None in the House knew of this Artifice and had her very smock known it it had been in eminent danger of burning for she knew how dangerous it would be to trust either to a Maid or
Sacrament if many abuse it Who knows not the corrupt Stomachs turn the best Meat into Crudities Besides all this the counter-sence of their words as well in Speech as Writing their cabalistique Cyphers and interlined Letters written by a Liquor which of invisible became visible by being held against the Fire and by such like means and many other wayes whereby they dayly maintained their wicked correspondence by abusing in so many several manners the goodness of this religious person who was thereby tost like a Ball betwixt two skilful Gamesters But if the wicked devices and odious sins which were acted in the Temple and in holy places by the Sons of Aaron and of Eli were so severely punisht by Divine Vengeance what punishment was due to these sacrilegious persons who not content to violate a Sacrament which is great and honourable and by an infamous Adultery projected and acted by them but also this other holy one which pronounceth on Earth the Decrees of Heaven miserably changing into a crime that which ought to serve them for an instruction of justification How oft like Uriah did they carry in their own Bosoms the sealed Packets of their condemnation but with as much wickedness and deceit as he had of ignorance and innocence But this sort of Writing and Speaking was not all the furious passion which so tormented them and robbed them of their repose was not an evil that could be healed so without coming to an effect their reciprocal being but too well desires known to one another that old Serpent the Devil Who hath so many names but more devices With which to mischief Sinners he entices He I say failed not to suggest unto them many means of seeing one another and that in such a manner as they desired for though in this sort of Vice the Gospel places the mental Adultry in a lustful look and a determinate mind to do evil yet the execution is not perfected by the view though these like those of the Basilisk strike death into the Soul the life of which consisteth in Grace which is lost by a mortal coveting Alcimus being assured of Vannoza's good will to him but evil in its self did soon find the way were it by the means of some friends or rather the irresistable force of his Coin to procure access to a house that joined to Capoleon's where by the conjunction of the roofs he facilitated his entrance to the Cabinet of Meditations of her who easily waived her devotion to yield her self to his There whilest her Husband thought her taken up with Celestial Contemplations she was exercised altogether in Earthly ones and in the possession of her new Lover Thus was this immodest Helena taken for a chaste Hecuba And thus these passionate Lovers being arrived to the top of their pretensions in the enjoyment of their delights as execrable as unjust thought they had found out the Elyzian Fields in this Garret But the pleasure of the wicked passeth in an instant and the Royal Prophet hath declared That he hath seen the wicked elevated above the Cedars of Lebanon which are the just and perfect Souls and soon after repassing by the same Thickets he has no longer perceived them because they were shrunk away and failed for as the wax melteth before the fire and the smoke dissipateth and vanisheth as it riseth higher so Sinners are brought to nought in God's presence in an instant This intercourse lasted but a while for these often frequentings of this house being observed by the Master of it who was not at all advertised of the reasons of them all the business being brought about by one of his Servants corrupted by Alcimus it presently buzzed suspition into his head a Vice natural unto the Italians and made him begin to look after the honour of his Wife who was rather capable to beget pity than desire See here an eclipse and parenthesis for some days to the interviews of our Lovers Thus crosses do in multitudes descend On those who ' gainst Gods righteous Laws offend But they like Mules and Beasts quite void of sence Feel not the rod nor turn from their offence But the same spirit of darkness that animated them being as fertile in invention as perswasive in wickedness to make them a passage through all the steps and degrees that lead to the highest top of iniquity suggested to them more of his Diabolick ways Diabolick do I say nay much worse than the artifices of Devils who are forced to confess their impuissance in sacred places which our wicked ones chose to make the execrable Theatre of their abominations whence comes it saith God by the mouth of a Prophet that they whom I loved have committed such crimes in my own house And if a fault which of it self is but venial or slightly punishable becomes inexpiable et crimen lesae Majestatis when acted in a Kingâ—s Palace as being a place of veneration and not to be dishonoured by an infamous act what new punishment must there be invented to inflict upon him who violates the Temple of the Immortal and Invisible King of Kings by detestable prophanations Of a certainty God will not hold for innocent him that pollutes the place of his abode and make that which is consecrated for a House of Prayer be converted into a Den of Thieves Within this House Lord nought is fit to be But what in holiness resembles thee Vannoza having no liberty to go abroad but to holy places in the company of her Mother Alcimus by an act doubly sacrilegious still frequented those Monasteries where there were to be Stations Indulgences or Processions of the Fraternities and there habited like the Religious of every several Monastery and Order where he was he hid himself in some private Chappels or secret and dark retiring places as those who do evil hate the light and was there visited by his devout Mistress where under pretence of Consolation Instruction or Confession they acted that which could scarce find remission from him who was thereby so highly dishonoured in his own habitation I am struck with horrour to discover deeds of so black a hue but it is to stamp some horrour in the Souls of those who act or are tempted to commit the like that I trace these lines upon this paper Those who know the dexterity and boldness of the Italian spirits principally when they are pricked forwards by this frantick passion which hath so puissant a dominion in their hearts will not find these horrid impudencies strange though to others of another Nation they may seem almost incredible Now as in the course of perfection it is the custome of those who use themselves to it to advance from virtue to virtue till by degrees they arrive at the top of the Coelestial Olympus so are there steps and degrees in evil and though as an Ancient saith there is no vice but what brings us to the brink of a Precipice yet another saith as truly None
Door after him he opened the Window to save himself that way by another leap like that of Vannoza and to precipitate himself into death by running from it But this proved no door of safety to him it being treillissed with Barrs of Iron for his defence he found nothing but Looking-Glasses Powders Perfumes and such like toys which Vannoza had used either to augment her Beauty or repair its defaults these had been the sparks that had help'd to raise such a flame in this young man's Soul but now those Odours only could serve to help to Embalm his Body For notwithstanding all the resistance he could make Capoleon and his followers soon entred into the Chamber and seeing Vannoza dispatched by her Fall and knowing from Adriana that Alcimus was shut into the Cabinet the door was quickly forced open and the young Cavalier being only in his shirt soon found himself pierced in divers places of his Body and constrain'd to yield unto the mercy of his Enemy who like the cruel Tiberius would not speed him too suddainly least he should thereby deprive himself of the pleasure of Revenge and therefore would stretch his Torments by the prolongation of his Life He dragg'd him into the Chamber and threw him on the Bed which he so lately had unhappily polluted to use him as they do those Robbers whom they execute upon the place where they acted their Villanies Fear so seized on Adriana that she run to hide herself though she had no cause to fear for that for which she expected a Reward Lisarda cried out Murther despairing of her Life but was laid hold on all undrest by Capoleon who sacrific'd her to his fury before Alcimus his face charging her with as many stabs as injurious words letting out her Soul and Blood together upon the spot Alcimus then might see before his eyes the cruelties and torments they prepared for him to suffer the report of which strikes a trembling and horrour into me like one who looks on affrightful wounds Capoleon to compleat his revenge he sent a Messenger speedily to the Monastery where Simplicius resided to beseech him to come to his Wife who was upon the point of death by a Catarre but desired to confess her self to him before she expired This good Father arose with all imaginable speed pressed forwards by a Holy Charity which causes a slighting and neglect of rest to run to the succour of Souls and service of our Neighbour principally in such urgent occasions of suddain death where the least delay is inexcusable He took to accompany him the first Brother of the Covent that he met and so run with all the haste imaginable to a mischief unjustly prepared for his Innocency He was no sooner entred the Chamber where Capoleon was tormenting Alcimus but this enraged old Man leaping on him like a Fury went to stab his Dagger into his breast but Nature foreing him to lift up his Arm he thereby saved his heart took the Stab there which was followed by another in his shoulder finally he was going to follow those with as many as should be more than enough to let out his harmless Soul if his barbarity had not withheld his Arm to bathe himself in the pleasure of his sufferings as he had done in those of the wretched Alcimus who lying stretch't upon the Bed endured far worse Convulsions than a Woman in her Travel The other Religious Brother who accompanied him was detained below by the other blood-hounds who abused him with blows and injuries which I dare not nay cannot report no more than those which were vomited by Capoleon against Simplicius Traytor Sacrilegious Execrable worthy of thousands of flames were the flowers of his Rhetorick as for the other villanous and filthy words I have no design here to register them There needs a more Eloquent Orator than I to express the astonishment of good Simplicius who coming to assist this Penitent in a holy death found himself betray'd to an undeserved one He was then hardly thoroughly awaked and was of a firm opinion that he was still sound asleep and all that he saw and felt pass'd but for a dream but at last his Wounds so brought him to himself that he was too sure that he was fully awaked Alcimus heavily lifting up his eye-lids all drench't and bathed in tears and blood and seeing this new dreadful spectacle and hearing a broken and languishing voice Alas said he with a mournful tone my Father to what abyss of mischiefs have my inquities plunged you And turning his face towards Capoleon Signeur pursued he 't is onely against me you ought to turn the point of your weapons and not upon this Innocent it is I only that am culpable and of whom alone you should take just vengeance which can never be so cruel as my wickedness deserves but imbrew not your hands in the blood of the just which God will be sure to require at your hands and exact from you a rigorous accompt of It is I alone have sinned and deceived and abus'd him and if you please to give me but one moments audience I will tell you in short the truth of the whole proceeding I am going to dye and neither expect or desire pardon from God if I lye or use any disguisement of the truth Then taking Capoleon's silence for consent he laid open as well as his throbs and pangs would suffer him that which we have recounted of Vannoza's Artifices and his own to defile the bed and betray the honour of Capoleon adding thereunto many other particularities most of which we have already recited but with what brevity he could his condition not admitting of a long discourse He made this publick and solemn Confession with so much repentance and contrition that his heart seemed to cleave asunder with sighs which broke out as fast as the blood gushed from his mouth and his eyes boyling over with tears as fast as the blood bubbled from his gastly Wounds How many pardons did he beg of God and of Capoleon detesting his faults and abhorring his iniquities O how many Lives could he have desired that he might expiate his crimes by as many deaths animating Capoleon to take all the revenges of him he could desire by the longest and most exquisite torments he could invent He absolutely cleared Simplicius of the Crime and made his Innocence unquestionably apparent which made Capoleon see the injustice of his Cruelty to him who thereupon ordered his Wounds to be bound up and in the next place sent to know certainly the condition of his Wife which vex'd him to the Soul when he was assured that her death had mock'd his Cruelty and robb'd him of a more severe revenge Before Simplicius was retired from this Bloody Spectacle Alcimus making the strongest of his weak efforts rouled himself upon the ground and so prostrate begged of Capoleon who held his Swords point bent against his Throat To have pity of his Soul though not of
his Body and to content himself with his Temporal death and not stretch his hatred to Eternity but to permit him to receive Absolution from Simplicius his hands Which the Cruel Capoleon would have denyed him so far did his rage transport him had not the injured Simplicius prevented him by steping to him and in this last extremity making him give the best testimony he could of his Contrition and thereupon giving him his lost Viaticum The words which Alcimus spake to him seeing him depart and leave him as a prey to his inhumane Enemy were sufficient to breed Pity in the insensible Rocks or in the Waves themselves which all hold inexorable but this bloody Tyger growing still more furious at this Mournful Musick consulted with his Affistants which environed him in what manner they should torment him to make his death more sensibly painful He commanded a fire to be lighted to burn him by degrees and laying him in the heat of the flames had not the parience to let the Element though merciless enough have the sole management of his vengeance he therefore begun with him as the Crow does with Carrion by first barbarously digging out his Eyes and in the next place with his Sword made him an Eunuch for that is the modestest name I can put upon so vile an action He then cut off the tips of his Fingers and Toes and after that his Nose Lips and Ears all which the poor Patient suffered with a Patience and Constancy that surmounted all imagination continually invoking the holy Name of Jesus from whom alone he expected Salvation His cruel Tormentor continuing his Revenge pierced his Legs Arms and Sides in many places and then applyed burning Torches to the Wounds nothing could soften the Cruelty of this enraged Old man his very Attendants people void of humanity could no longer endure the sight of this Barbarity but conjured him to give him the Stab of grace that is to say to pierce his heart and dispatch and free him from his misery otherwise that they should be constrained to do him that miserable courtesie At last when this wretched body opened in so many places and casting out blood on all sides remained without pulse or motion and was ready to breathe out the last sigh of its expiring breath with a faint and languishing voice making his last invocation of mercy from his Redeemer Capoleon then fearing that he had escaped his cruelty suddainly ript up his Breast snatch'd out his Heart and threw it in his face as they do in England with their Traytors And thus expired the unhappy Alcimus drawn like an Ox to the slaughter by a wicked Woman to use the Wise Man's saying having scarce body enough to contain the Wounds which the Old Man made there who would lastly have thrown his mangled Body into the fire had he not been restrained by a desire to expose to the Peoples view these Three Bodies which he had sacrificed to his rage Simplicius having seen the bruised Body of Vannoza filled with horrour and astonishment to avoid further danger of injuries and abuses fled as speedily as he could with his Companion to the Convent to secure themselves and to look after the cure of his Wounds The alarm was there in an instant taken and from thence ecchoed through the City Aurora had scarce begun to peep out of her obscure bed but seized with horrour at at the sight of so much blood which spurted in her face as she peep'd into the Chamber she would willingly have returned to her lodging being almost afraid to discover to the approaching Sun so Bloody and so Tragical a Spectacle Finally the day beginning to discover the colour of things the Street was fill'd with people Capoleon's Door was besieged by the Crowd every one flocking to know what had passed Capoleon bold and hardy as a right Murtherer and one that knew the Laws and Justice by the Custome of that City bended towards his side fearlesly attended the arrival of the Officers to whose Eyes he exposed those Massacred bodies which he with fire and Sword had so inhumanly mangled If his severity were accused by some his cruelty was as much condemned by others every one judging of the action according to their divers sentiments but he having brought evident proofs of the adultery and Sacriledge of Alcimus and his Wife and the treachery of his Maid Lisarda who had been confederate in their crime the Murthered remained dead without possibility of being revenged and Capoleon free without fear of punishment having onely anticipated the reward of their Crimes and prevented the hand of Justice But because that in the City where this Tragick Adventure happened the Ecclesiastick bear a great sway the Wounds of Simplicius and the unworthy usage of the Religious Brother that accompanied him caused him to be confined to his house till there were a better information made of the proceedings This good and truly Religious Father resolved to preserve his wonted Patience and readiness to pardon Offences and therefore formed no Process against Capoleon but contrarily excused him all he could alledging the strong suspition he had of him till cleared by Alcimus his Confession Notwithstanding which those Ministers of Justice though they absolved Capoleon of the principal Murther yet were resolved to prosecute him to the utmost for this inconsiderate Wounding of Simplicius And though Simplicius cryed out That he required no further satisfaction for his wrongs yet the Fiscal leaving his particular Concern undertook the Publick one of the whole Church which was abus'd and wronged in this injury of one of its Members who was not so much troubled at his unjust Wounding as that they should envy him the glory of Martyrdome being willing to suffer far more than he had hitherto done in the cause of Piety and Justice This Alarm rouzed up Capoleon who thereupon thought it most convenient and healthful to go take a little Country-Air hoping to find more security in a suddain flight than in a dangerous delay and make his Accord the best at a distance But in the mean time the Town was in a Commotion and an Uproar for the Parents of Alcimus and those of Vannoza were resolved not to put up so irrepairable wrongs as were the inhumane butchery of their Children but were determined to bathe their injuries and wash off the disgrace of their Families in the blood of the Cruel Capoleon a Remedy worse than the Disease This makes me admire the frailty of humane Nature which by an extream blindness in the execution of its disordinate passions proceeds from bad to worse As if the death of Capoleon could render Alcimus and Vannoza less Sacrilegious or Adulterous and as if by this Homicide they could efface irreparable Infamy with which their Family was sullied and disgraced See here the paths and ways of revenge which the blind actors account a reasonable reparation for the outrages they would punish Vannoza's Parents with Money hire and
be imposed upon a Cloister'd person but soon after fell into a matchless Frenzy and a disconsolate despair beyond the advice or comfort of any Irremediable griefs her Soul torment And she 's consum'd with mortal discontent At length perceiving that she might long torment and vex her self before the walls that environed her like those of Jericho would prostrate themselves at the noise of her lamentations there fell into her fancy so extravagant an invention as I should be as much ashamed to relate as the Reader will be apt to laugh at as a Fable were there not a thousand and a thousand witnesses of it's verity Prophane Writings are Vermine which creep into the most Sacred places through the curiosity of the Inhabitants And though they are apt to corrupt good Manners and alter the chastest Resolutions yet it cannot be prevented but that the most retired Vestals will sometimes cast an eye upon their diverting pages where learning that which before they knew not or refreshing their Memory of that which a long discontinuance had made them bury in oblivion they either beget or awake in them the Idea's of a thousand Inquietudes This puts me in mind of the Roman Vestal who having read in a Poet that which had stirr'd in her a criminal passion one day ravish'd by the force of Imagination she unwittingly cry'd out Kill me if Love ben't a delicious thing And Marriage do not matchless pleasures bring Which so scandalized those that heard her that she was by them brought before the Censour there to be chastized as one that had broken the Integrity which she ought to preserve under pain of death And that which is remarkable is That Perjury was forbidden amongst them with the same rigour as Dishonesty The Censour upon this Accusation adjudged her to be buried alive the common punishment of those who had violated the Chastity which they had vow'd to Vesta This Vestal protesting that she was a Virgin and that her Body was pure from the corruptions of pleasure The Judge who condemned her for her words did by the same convince her saying to her Either thou hast experimented unlawful pleasures which make thee culpable Or if thou hast not thy Perjury makes thee deserve death by affirming that which thou art ignorant of This Dilemma stopt her mouth and the rigorous Sentence was executed upon her Certainly we live under a Law so much more exact as it is incomparably more pure more true more just than that of the ancient Romans benighted with the thick Fogs and clouds of Paganism For the Spouse of holy Virgins is so delicate that he is not onely jealous of the purity of their bodies but even of that of their thoughts so that to see him and be happy they must be pure in heart Whatsoever then may in the least sully this lovely whiteness ought to be as carefully avoided as the Ermin shuns what may defile her curious Furre Let tender Virgins therefore avoid as Rocks and Shelves these impure Books since under their words of honey and flourishing expressions are hid the Serpents of dangerous imaginations The Monastery wherein Polixena was inclosed was of great Eminency and full of Cloyster'd Virgins but whether so lively as they ought I know not However it were this Maid was pleased with the reading of foolish and fabulous Books such as are Poetry and Romances Amongst the Images of Piety and Devotion there often slide into the holy places licentious Pictures which also make unhandsome impressions in weak and tender spirits though they be onely there under the pretext of Hangings and Imbroideries whence it happens that somethings the most fabulous and ridiculous oft pass for truths in their belief and take place of more solid Idea's This happen'd to Polixena who reading of the imaginary artifice of Dedalus his wings by which he escaped the Cretan Prison and oft fixing her eyes upon a Picture represented this Fable and having formerly in Hangings wrought it with her Needle with which she had made curious Wings which balanced the father and his son Icarus in the Air this story wrought so upon her melancholy and distracted fancy that she would try to imitate the cunning of the one without remembring the folly and misfortune of the other She heaped together from all parts as many feathers as she could and bought abundance besides many intire Birds whose feathers pleased her as much as their flesh did others with these she pretended to make Chaplets and Garlands and such like pretty toys in which those of her Sex and condition are for the most part incomparably ingenious They let her alone hoping it might divert her Melancholy She made a large habit of Feathers artificially wrought upon a linnen Robe fitted to her body and then fashioned two large Wings with which by the moving of her Arms she thought she could bear up her self in the Air and if need were fly with this brave accoutrement even into another World Her design was to go find her Parents in what part of the World soever they abode and if they consented not to marry her to Lucio to fly to him and summon him to perform his promise which was to reverse the Fable of Leda who was coupled with a Swan See here the extravagant vanity of a spirit transported with Love and then tell me whether the blind deity which presides over this passion have not wings But it was not enough to put on these toys without she use them having therefore one Evening fitted up all her fair feathered attire and passed all the Night in an unspeakable extravagancy in which she made as many rounds about the World as Job's malicious Wanderer and not having been able to close her eyes it was easie for her to rise sooner in the Morning than any of the rest Being therefore mounted upon the Steeple and having fitted on her Habit in which she thought to out-flye the Eagle and feared nothing but being born up too high and too near the Sun she cast her self with extended Arms from her lofty station But never Hawk struck down so violently upon his Prey as she precipitated her self to the ground where she was crush't almost into as many pieces as she had feathers on her Habit. Morning being come she who had charge to ring the Bell passing through the Cloisters was ready to sink down with fear seeing this Bird stretch't out at length of a greater bulk by far than she had ever seen before fear put wings to her feet if not greater yet however swifter than those which the Miserable Polixena had fixed to her Arms. This Maid was her self the Bell that suddainly sounded up all the Convent The trembling Doves beheld this affrightful Eagle through the Windows of their Cells and could almost have crept into the crannies of the Walls to hide themselves from so terrible a Creature of which they had never seen nor heard the like Some took it for a Dragon others for a Griffon and all for that which their natural pusillanimity dictated unto them At last having taken somewhat better courage and fortified themselves with the Cross and Holy-Water they approached the breathless Corps of Polixena so battered and bruised principally her head that it was hard to know her At last they understood the folly and to what design she had amassed so many Feathers and her Companions calling to mind her ordinary discourses about Dedalus and Icarus and her desires to be turn'd into a Bird and many other her extravagancies conjectured it to be as we have said and it was as soon divulged through the City the strangeness of the Event serving a long time for discourse and entertainment Some pitied her others laughed at her and as there are as many different Minds in the World as men every one judged of it according to their fancy The wiser sort blamed her Parents who had rather imprisoned then vowed her to God who accepts none but voluntary sacrifices Her folly however somewhat excused her despair being overcome by an enraged passion which had in others upon like occasion produced more tragical though none so ridiculous events I shall conclude all with a short Meditation which at that time was that of Simplicius who as on the top of a rock mounted high above the reach of the fiercest waves from thence beheld all these furious tempests of a disturbed Sea and considering how fearfully the hand of God darts lighting upon the heads of the incorrigibly impious after the serious scanning of all the particulars we have before related he shut up his Contemplation as we shall do our Discourse with these words of the Divine Singer Thou who the God of Justice art Wilt never take the wicked's part Sinners shall not abide with thee Who foolish innocency use And mock at thee and thine abuse Shall in an instant scatter'd be This strictest Judgments shall pursue False men that alwaies speak untrue Being still averse from what is good Thus Scourges shall or'etake from far The people that delight in War And pleasure take in shedding blood The End of the Fourth and last Book