While this comedy was in progress in Cuenca, a similar one was performing in Madrid, in the highest social ranks. Sor María Clara Rosa de Jesus, known as the Beata Clara, had acquired great reputation by her visions and miracles. She was, or pretended to be, paralyzed and unable to leave her bed and, when she announced that a special command of the Holy Ghost required her to join the Capuchin Order, Pius VI granted her a dispensation to take the vows without residence. Atanasio de Puyal, subsequently Bishop of Calahorra, obtained licence to erect a private altar in her chamber, where mass was celebrated daily, and she received communion, pretending to take no other nourishment. All the great ladies of the court were accustomed to implore her intercession in their troubles and gave her large sums to be expended in charity. It is to the credit of the Inquisition that it broke up this speculative imposture by arresting her, in 1801, together with her mother and confessor as accomplices. It was not difficult to prove their guilt and, in 1803, they were mercifully sentenced to reclusion.[168] For three hundred years, up to the time of its suppression, the Inquisition, thus vainly labored to put an end to these speculations on the credulity of the faithful. It did its best, but the popular craving for the marvellous, for concrete evidence of divine interposition in human affairs, was too universal and too strong to be controlled, even by its supreme authority. After its downfall, the career of the notorious Sor Patrocinio proves how ineradicable was this and serves to bring medievalism down to our own time. [Sidenote: _IMPOSTORS_]