Untitled - Shattering Denial

94
THE INQUISITION
plainly the work of the Evil Spirit.
is a woman possessed of the devil.
A woman with child
"Pray God," said
one of "the Perfected" to the wife of a Toulouse lumber
merchant, "pray God that he deliver you from the devil
l
within The you."
greatest evil that could befall a
woman was to die enceinte; for being in the state of
impurity and in the power of Satan, she could not
be saved. We read of the Cathari saying this to Peirona
de la Caustra: quod si decederet prcegnans non posset
salvari. 2
Marriage, because it made such a condition possible,
was absolutely condemned. Bernard Gui thus resumes
the teaching of the Cathari on this point: "They con
demn marriage absolutely; they maintain that it is a
perpetual state of sin; they deny that a good God
can institute it. They declare the marital relation as
great a sin as incest with one s mother, daughter, or
sister." 3 And this is by no means a calumnious charge.
The language which Bernard Gui attributes to these
heretics was used by them on every possible occasion.
They were unable to find words strong enough to express
their contempt for marriage. "Marriage," they said,
"is nothing but licentiousness; marriage is merely prosti-
1 "Quod rogaret Deum ut liberaret earn de dzemone quam
habebat in
ventre." Dollinger, ibid., p. 35. "Quod prsegnans erat de daemonic."
Ms. 609, of the library of Toulouse, fol. 230.
2 Doat, vol. xxii, p. 57.
3 Practica Inquistiionis, p. 130.