Huic erat amasius, ut scriptores credunt.
Patria relinquitur Moguntia, Græcorum
Studiosè petitur schola. Pòst doctorum
Hæc doctrix efficitur Romæ legens: horum
Hæc auditu fungitur loquens. Hinc prostrato
Summo hæc eligitur: sexu exaltato
Quandoque negligitur. Fatur quòd hæc nato
Per servum conficitur. Tempore gignendi
Ad processum equus scanditur, vice flendi,
Papa cadit, panditur improbis ridendi
Norma, puer nascitur in vico Clementis,
Colossœum jungitur. Corpus parentis
In eodem traditur sepulturæ gentis,
Faturque scriptoribus, quòd Papa præfato,
Vico senioribus transiens amato
Congruo ductoribus sequitur negato
Loco, quo Ecclesia partu denigratur,
Quamvis inter spacia Pontificum ponatur,
Propter sexum.”
Stephen Blanch, in his “Urbis Romæ Mirabilia,” says that an angel of heaven appeared to Joan before the event, and asked her to choose whether she should prefer burning eternally in hell, or having her confinement in public; with sense which does her credit, she chose the latter. The Protestant writers were not satisfied that the father of the unhappy baby should have been a servant: some made him a Cardinal, and others the devil himself. According to an eminent Dutch minister, it is immaterial whether the child be fathered on Satan or a monk: at all events, the former took a
