Vestiges of ancient manners and customs, discoverable in modern Italy and Sicily / By the Rev. John James Blunt.

  • John James Blunt
Date:
1823
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Vestiges of ancient manners and customs, discoverable in modern Italy and Sicily / By the Rev. John James Blunt. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    self-interested individuals. Priests ill paid, and hordes of friars, mendicants by profession, have been tempted to lay under heavy con- tribution the credulity of the public; and accordingly we find most cathedrals, as well as nearly all the chapels of the regular clergy, possessed of images or relics said to be en- dowed with miraculous virtues, while a box is at hand to receive the offerings of those who, out of gratitude for the past, or hope for the future, are disposed to give their mite for the good of the church. I have seen the poor fishermen at Catania regularly greeted on their arrival at the coast with the produce of their day’s toil, by the craving voice of a Capuchin or Franciscan; nor has that been refused to the holy vagrant which ordinary beggars, though wrung with distress, would have be- sought in vain. Indeed few persons are so poor as to escape subscribing their quota towards filling the satchels of these men, or
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