to his own experience, convincing
him that it was not an affair of magic but of science.' Henri, who might
have been disappointed by this result, was taken with his teacher, and
appointed him Reader Extraordinary--a post that did not oblige Bruno to
hear Mass. The Ordinary Readers at Paris had to conform to the usages of
the Catholic Church. On his side, Bruno appears to have conceived high
admiration for the king's ability. In the _Cena della Ceneri_ and the
_Spaccio della Bestia Trionfante,_ composed and published after he had
left France, he paid him compliments in terms of hyperbolical laudation.
It would be vain to comment on these facts. No one conversant with
French society at that epoch could have been ignorant of Henri's
character and vicious life. No one could have pretended that his
employment of the kingdom's wealth to enrich unworthy favorites was
anything but dishonorable, or have maintained that his flagrant
effeminacy was beneficial to society. The fantastic superstition which
the king indulged alternately with sensual extravagances, must have been
odious to one whose spiritual mistress was divine Sophia, and whose
religion was an adoration of the intellect for the One Cause. But Henri
had one quality which seemed of supreme excellence to Bruno. He
appreciated speculation and encouraged men of learning. A man so
enthusiastic as our philosopher may have thought that his own teaching
could expel that Beast Triumphant of the vices from a royal heart
tainted by bad education in a corrupt Court. Bruno, moreover, it must be
remembered, remained curiously inappreciative of the revolution effected
in humanity by Christian morals. Much that is repulsive to us in the
manners of the Valois, may have been indifferent to him.

Bruno had just passed his thirtieth year. He was a man of middling
height, spare figure, and olive complexion, wearing a short
chestnut-colored beard. He spoke with vivacity and copious rhetoric,
aiming rather at force than at purity of diction, indulging in trenchant
metaphors to adumbrate recondite thoughts, passing from grotesque images
to impassioned flights of declamation, blending acute arguments and
pungent satires with grave mystical discourses. The impression of
originality produced by his familiar conversation rendered him agreeable
to princes. There was nothing of the pedant in his nature, nothing about
him of the doctor but his title.

After a residence of rather less than four yea