Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 2.djvu/38

22 LANGUEDOC. signed to the stake, when the prophetic spirit of St. Dominic, fore- seeing that he would return to the Church and perform shining service in the cause of God, rescued him from the flames. On April 2, without heralding, he presented himself at the Domini- can convent, humbly begged to be received into the Church, and promised to do whatever should be required of him. With the eagerness of an impassioned convert he proceeded to reveal all that hfelong intercourse with the Cathari had brought to his knowledge. So full were his recollections that several days w^ere required to write down all the names and facts that crowded to his hps. The lists were long and embraced prominent nobles and citizens, confirming suspicion in many cases, and reveahng heresy in other quarters where it was wholly unlooked for. Guillem Arnaud hurried back from Montauban to take full ad- vantage of this act of Providence. The heretics were stunned. None of them dared to deny the truth of the accusations made by Kaymond Gros. Many fled, some of whose names reappear in the massacre of Avignonet and the final catastrophe of Montsegur. Many recanted and furnished further revelations. Long fists were made out of those who had been hereticated on their death-beds, and multitudes of corpses were exhumed and burned, with the re- sultant harvest of confiscations. It is difficult to exaggerate the severity of the blow thus received by heresy. Toulouse was its headquarters. Here were the nobles and knights, the consuls and rich burghers who had thus far defied scrutiny and had protected their less fortunate comrades. Now scattered and persecuted, forced to recant, or burned, the power of the secret organization was broken irrevocably. We can well appreciate the pious exulta- tion of the chronicler as he winds up his account of the conster- nation and destruction thus visited upon the heretical community — " Thmr names are not written in the Book of Life, but their bod- ies herC were burned and their souls are tortured in hell !" A single sentence of February 19, 1238, in which more than twenty penitents were consigned en masse to perpetual imprisonment, shows the extent of the harvest and the haste of the harvesters.* ^ Pelisso Chron. pp. 43-51.-Coll. Doat, XXI. 149.-It is probable that among these victims perished Vigoros de Bocona, a Catharan bishop. Alberic de Trois Fontaines places his burning in Toulouse in 1233 (Chron. ann. 1333), but there is