The History of the Devils of Loudun, Volumes I-III: The Alleged Possession of the Ursuline Nuns, and the Trial and Execution of Urbain Grandier, Told by an Eye-witnessDes Niau
History
The History of the Devils of Loudun, Volumes I-III: The Alleged Possession of the Ursuline Nuns, and the Trial and Execution of Urbain Grandier, Told by an Eye-witness
Des Niau
Couvent des Ursulines (Loudun, France); Demoniac possession; Grandier, Urbain, 1590-1634
But the end of the magician was not the end of the effects of his
sorcery; and the possessions, far from ceasing, as had been hoped,
continued for a time. God permitted that a great number of those who
had been connected with the affair should be more or less vexed by
demons. The Civil Lieutenant, Louis Chauvet, was seized with such fear
that his mind gave way, and he never recovered. The Sieur Mannouri, the
Surgeon who had sounded the marks[13] which the devil had impressed
on the magician priest, suffering from extraordinary troubles, was of
course said by the friends of Grandier to be the victim of remorse.
Here are the particulars of the death of this Surgeon--
One night as he was returning about ten o'clock from visiting a sick
man, walking with a friend, and accompanied by a man carrying a
lantern, he cried all of a sudden, like a man awaking from a dream,
"Ah! there is Grandier! what do you want?" At the same time he was
seized with trembling. The two men took him back to his home, while he
continued to talk to Grandier whom he thought he had before his eyes.
He was put to bed filled with the same illusion, and shaking in every
limb. He only lived a few days, during which his state never changed.
He died believing the magician was still before him, and making efforts
to keep him at arm's length.
Father Lactance, the worthy monk who had assisted the possessed in
their sufferings, was himself attacked some time after the death of the
priest. Feeling the first symptoms, he determined to go to Notre Dame
des Ardilliers, whose chapel served by the priests of the oratory is
held in great veneration in Saumur and its neighbourhood. M. de Canaye,
who was going into the country, gave him a seat in his carriage. He had
heard speak of his state, and knew that he was tormented by the devil,
but he nevertheless joked about the matter, when, all of a sudden,
whilst rolling along a perfectly level road, the carriage turned over
with the wheels in the air without any one being in any way hurt. The
next day they continued their voyage to Saumur when the carriage again
turned over in the same way in the middle of the Rue du Faubourg de
Fenet, which is perfectly smooth, and leads to the chapel of Ardillier.
This holy monk afterwards experienced the greatest vexations from the
demons, who at times deprived him of sight, and at times of memory;
they produced in him violent fits of nausea, dulled his intelligence,
and worried him in numerous ways. At length, after being tried by so
many evils, God called him to Him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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