... Wrapping up her wreathed body round,
She leaped upon his shield and her huge train
All suddenly about his body wound,
That hand and foot he strove to stir in vain.
God help the man so wrapt in Error's endless chain.
The Lady Una cries out:
... Now, now, sir knight, shew what ye bee,
Add faith unto thy force, and be not faint.
Strangle her, else she sure will strangle thee.
He follows her advice, makes one desperate effort, Error is slain, and the pilgrimage resumed.
Thus it is taught that the Church has waged successful battle with Error in all its forms—paganism, Arianism, Socinianism, infidelity; and in all ages of her history, whether crouching in the lofty groves of the Druids, or in the more insidious forms of later Christian heresy.
The Hermitage.—On leaving the Wood of Error, the knight and Lady Una encounter a venerable hermit, and are led into his hermitage. This is Archimago, a vile magician thus disguised, and in his retreat foul spirits personate both knight and lady, and present these false doubles to each. Each sees what seems to be the other's fall from virtue, and, horrified by the sight, the real persons leave the hermitage by separate ways, and wander, in inextricable mazes lost, until fortune and faery bring them together again and disclose the truth.
Here Spenser, who was a zealous Protestant, designs to present the monastic system, the disfavor into which the monasteries had fallen, and the black arts secretly studied among better arts in the cloisters, especially in the period just succeeding the Norman conquest.
The Crusades.—As another specimen of the historic interpretation, we may trace the adventures of England in the Crusades, as presented in the encounter of St. George with Sansfoy, (without faith,) or the Infidel.
From the hermitage of Archimago,
The true St. George had wandered far away,
Still flying from his thoughts and jealous fear,
Will was his guide, and grief led him astray;
At last him chanced to meet upon the way
A faithless Saracen all armed to point,
In whose great shield was writ with letters gay
Sansfoy: full large of limb, and every joint
He was, and cared not for God or man a point.