fame alone. No one was constrained to
pay, it is true; but it would have been a very unhandsome thing not to make
a preliminary contribution to Monsieur le Cure's poor-box.

Little presents have always maintained friendship, and there is nothing
like sterling silver to predispose the benevolence of the saints and the
love of heaven in our favour.

While on the contrary:

A poorly furnished niche affronts the saint:
The God deserts, and when we enter, shows
His anger from the door of his poor shrine.

He no longer worked every-day, but on fete-days.

All the cripples came from twenty leagues round, and there were miracles
then for crutches.

As in the time of Paris the deacon, when Cardinal de Noailles kept a
register of the wonders of St. Medard's Cemetery, a churchwarden of the
place, assisted by two secretaries and the corporal of Gendarmes,
religiously inscribed the miraculous cures of the saint on a magnificent
volume.

_Credible_ witnesses attested these prodigies and, if necessary, gave
details to the incredulous.

If all were not cured, they had the hope of being so, which was a
consolation.

"And then," whispered Monsieur Ridoux in the ear of sceptics, "if the
touching of these blessed bones produces no benefit, you are sure it will
do no harm, and you cannot say the same of your doctor's drugs."

[Footnote 1: The Holy Prepuce is at Rome in the Church of St. John Lateran;
it is also at St. James of Compostelia in Spain; at Anvers; in the Abbey of
St. Corneille at Compiegne; at Our Lady of the Dove, in the diocese of
Chartres, in the Cathedral of Puy-en-Velay; and in several other places
(Voltaire, Dictionnaire philosophique).

The Able X...., author of _Maudit_ also places the holy fragment in the
church of Chanoux (Vienne) and asserts that a Bishop of Chalone in the 18th
century threw a pattern of it into the river.]

[Footnote 2: Ainsi parchait a Sinay un caphar, qui Sainct Antoine mettoit
le feu es jambes; Sainct Eutrope faisait les hydropiques; Sainct Gildas les
fols; Sainct Genou les gouttes. Mais je le punis en tel exemple, quoi qu'il
m'appelast heretique, que depuis ce temps caphar quiconque n'est ause
entrer en mes terres.

Et m'esbahi si vostre roi les laisse perscher par son royaulme tels
scandales. Car plus sont a punir que ceulx qui par art magique ou sultre
engin auraient mis la peste par le pays. La peste ne tue que le corps, mais
tels imposteurs empoisennent les ames. (Rabel