he uniform and
extraordinary character, of those of earlier date: the emblem was kept
by the force of tradition, but the meaning thereof was utterly changed.
The Pisani, for instance, carved lions and lionesses under all their
pulpits; some of them are merely looking dignified, others devouring
their prey, but they are conceived by a semi-heraldic decorator or an
intelligent naturalist; nay, the spirit of St. Francis has entered into
the sculptors, the feeling for animal piety and happiness, to the extent
of representing the lionesses as suckling and tenderly licking their
whelps. The men of that time cannot even conceive, in their newly acquired
faith and joy in God and His creatures, what feelings must have been
uppermost in the men who first set the fashion of adorning churches with
men-devouring monsters.

Such were my impressions during those days spent among the serene
Lucchese churches and their terrible emblems. And under their influence,
thinking of the times which had built the churches and carved the
emblems, there came to my memory a very curious anecdote, unearthed
by the learned ecclesiastical historian Tocco, and consigned in his
extremely suggestive book on mediaeval heresies. A certain priest of
Milan became so revered for his sanctity and learning, and for the
marvellous cures he worked, that the people insisted on burying him
before the high altar, and resorting to his tomb as to that of a saint.
The holy man became even more undoubtedly saintly after his death; and
in the face of the miracles which were wrought by his intercession, it
became necessary to proceed to his beatification. The Church was about
to establish his miraculous sainthood, when, in the official process
of collecting the necessary information, it was discovered that the
supposed saint was a Manichean heretic, a _Catharus_, a believer in the
wicked Demiurgus, the creating Satan, the defeat of the spiritual God,
and the uselessness of the coming of Christ. It was quite probable that
he had spat upon the crucifix as a symbol of the devil's triumph; it was
quite possible that he had said masses to Satan as the true creator of
all matter. Be this as it may, that priest's half-canonised bones were
publicly burnt and their ashes scattered to the wind. The anecdote shows
that the Manichean heresies, some ascetic and tender, others brutal and
foul, had made their way into the most holy places. And, indeed, when we
come to think of it, no lo