But the enterprise of the Jew was not confined to the importation and distribution of luxuries. He furnished society with every species of merchandise, from the crown of the monarch to the sandals of the beggar. The law forbade him to be seated by an ecclesiastic without the latter’s invitation, but the bishop was compelled to purchase of him the sacerdotal vestments in which his race was anathematized; and the sacred furniture of the altar, including even the crucifix, the significant emblem of the Passion, was sold to the cathedral chapter by the descendants of those who had enacted the tragedy of Golgotha, and had trafficked in the body and blood of our Saviour. The Jews of Provence paid their tribute to the Church in wax, and provided the tapers used in the ceremonies of great religious festivals. The vessels destined for the celebration of the mass were frequently disposed of to Jewish merchants by dishonest custodians; and this sacrilegious trade became at one time so notorious and shameless in France as to call forth the indignant denunciation of the Holy See. The pawning of objects consecrated to Christian worship for loans ostensibly contracted for the benefit of the Church was one of the most flagrant abuses of ecclesiastical authority in mediæval times. These pledges, often forfeited, became the property of the lender, and the clergy were constantly subjected to the scandal arising from their exposure for sale in the shops and public markets. It was no unusual circumstance in those days for the greater part of the sacred plate of an entire diocese to be temporarily in the hands of Jewish usurers. It was, moreover, a matter of common notoriety that the families of wealthy Jewish brokers daily drank from golden chalices in which once had been offered the holy sacramental wine of the mass.