to be endowed with supernatural power--the
priests--were but the obvious results of a world-system, founded on a
revealed and exact religion.

The Latin poets, whose study would probably have counteracted the
universal barbarism, were regarded as dangerous, the gods of antiquity
being identified with the demons of the Scriptures. This view was
responsible for the loss of many a valuable manuscript. The favourite
haunts of the demons were the convents, originally designed as
battlefields on which the struggles with the demons were to be fought
out, but frequently perishing in superstition and ignorance. Every monk
had visions of devils; miracles occurred continually; the torturing
problem was as to whether they were worked by God or the devil. Nature
was merely a collection of mystic symbols, divine--or perhaps
diabolical--allegories, whose meaning could be discovered by a correct
interpretation of the Bible. Everything which could possibly happen was
recorded in the Scriptures; they contained the true explanation of all
things. It was only a matter of selecting the right word and
interpreting it correctly, for every word was ambiguous and allegorical.
Every natural occurrence--an eclipse of the sun, a comet, or even a
fire--stood for something else; it was the symbol of a spiritual event
concealed behind a phenomenon. The allegorical interpretation of the
Bible was carried to the point of abstruseness because every word was
considered of necessity to have an unfathomably profound meaning. The
following amazing interpretation is by the highly-gifted German poet and
mystic, Suso: "Among the great number of Solomon's wives was a black
woman whom the king loved above all others. Now what does the Holy Ghost
mean by this? The charming black woman in whom God delights more than in
any other, is a man patiently bearing the trials which God sends him."
Abelard's interpretation of the black woman is even worse; he maintained
that though she was black outside, her bones, that is her character,
were white. A really remarkable deed of bad taste was committed by the
monk, Matfre Ermengau, the author of the _Breviari d'Amor_, at a time
when civilisation had already made considerable strides. He sent his
sister a Christmas present, consisting of a honey-cake, mead, and a
roast capon, accompanied by the following letter: "The mead is the blood
of Christ, the honey-cake and the capon are His body, which for our
salvation was baked and