Vipert, Archdeacon of the Church of Toul, cotemporary author of the Life of the holy Pope Leo IX., who died 1059, relates[[488]] that, some years before the death of this holy pope, an infinite multitude of persons, habited in white, was seen to pass by the town of Narni, advancing from the eastern side. This troop defiled from the morning until three in the afternoon, but towards evening it notably diminished. At this sight all the population of the town of Narni mounted upon the walls, fearing they might be hostile troops, and saw them defile with extreme surprise.
One burgher, more resolute than the others, went out of the town, and having observed in the crowd a man of his acquaintance, called to him by name, and asked him the meaning of this multitude of travelers: he replied, "We are spirits which not having yet expiated all our sins, and not being as yet sufficiently pure to enter the kingdom of heaven, we are going into holy places in a spirit of repentance; we are now coming from visiting the tomb of St. Martin, and we are going straight to Notre-Dame de Farse." The man was so frightened at this vision that he was ill for a twelvemonth—it was he who recounted the circumstance to Pope Leo IX. All the town of Narni was witness to this procession, which took place in broad day.
The night preceding the battle which was fought in Egypt between Mark Antony and Cæsar,[[489]] whilst all the city of Alexandria was in extreme uneasiness in expectation of this action, they saw in the city what appeared a multitude of people, who shouted and howled like bacchanals, and they heard a confused sound of instruments in honor of Bacchus, as Mark Antony was accustomed to celebrate this kind of festivals. This troop, after having run through the greater part of the town, went out of it by the door leading to the enemy, and disappeared.
That is all which has come to my knowledge concerning the vampires and ghosts of Hungary, Moravia, Silesia, and Poland, and of the other ghosts of France and Germany. We will explain our opinion after this on the reality, and other circumstances of these sorts of revived and resuscitated beings. Here follows another species, which is not less marvelous—I mean the excommunicated, who leave the church and their graves with their bodies, and do not re-enter till after the sacrifice is completed.
Footnotes:
[[483]] Betrus Venerab. Abb. Cluniac. de miracul. lib. i. c. 28. p. 1293.
[[484]] Lib. ii. de Civ. Dei, cap. 24.
[[485]] Aug. lib. ii. de Civ. Dei, c. 25.
[[486]] Trith. Chron. Hirs. p. 155, ad an. 1013.
[[487]] Idem, tom. ii. Chron. Hirs. p. 227.