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Narratives of Sorcery and Magic, from the Most Authentic Sources
Narratives of Sorcery and Magic from the Most Authentic Sources Author:Thomas Wright Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: TRIAL OF BONIFACE VIII. 33 CHAPTER III. FURTHER POLITICAL USAGE OF THE BELIEF IN SORCERY. THE TEMPLARS. The history of the lady Alice Kyteler is one ... more »of the most remarkable examples that the middle ages have left us of the use which might be made of popular superstition as a means of oppression or vengeance, when other more legitimate means were wanting. France and Italy had, however, recently presented a case in which the belief in sorcery had been used as a weapon against a still higher personage. It is not necessary to enter into a detailed history of the quarrel between the French monarch, Philippe le Bel, and the pope, Boniface VIII. It originated in the determination of the king to check in his own dominions the power and insolence of the church, and the ambitious pretensions of the see of Rome. In 1303, Philippe's ministers and agents, having collected pretended evidence in Italy, boldly accused Boniface of heresy and sorcery ; and the king called a council at Paris, to hear witnesses and pronounce judgment. The pope resisted, and refused to acknowledge a council not called by himself; but the insults and outrages to which he Was exposed proved too much for him, and he died the same year, in the midst of these vindictive proceedings. His enemies spread abroad a report that in his last moments he had confessed his league with the demon, and that his death was attended with " so much thunder and tempest, with dragons flying in the air and vomiting flames, and such lightning and other prodigies, that the people of Rome believed that the whole city was going to be swallowed up in the abyss." His successor, Benedict XL, undertook to defend his memory; but he died in the first year of his pontificate (in 1304), it was said by poison, and the holy see remained vacant...« less