He explains his disengagement from all creeds by referring to his parentage:
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Che nato son d'una monaca greca, E d'un papasso in Bursia là in Turchia. |
Beginning life by murdering his father, he next set out to seek adventures in the world:
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E per compagni ne menai con meco Tutt'i peccati o di turco o di greco, Anzi quanti ne son giù nell'inferno: Io n'ho settanta e sette de' mortali, Che non mi lascian mai la state o 'l verno; Pensa quanti io n'ho poi de' veniali! |
Margutte's humor consists in the baboon-like self-contentment of his infamous confessions, and in the effect they produce upon Morgante, who feels that he has found in him a finished gentleman. After amusing his audience with this puppet for a while, Pulci flings him aside. Margutte, like Pietro Aretino, dies at last of immoderate laughter.[547]
Another of Pulci's own creations is Astarotte, the proud and courteous fiend, summoned by Malagigi to bring Rinaldo from Egypt to Roncesvalles. This feat he accomplishes in a few hours by entering the body of the horse Baiardo. The journey consists of a series of splendid leaps, across lakes, rivers, mountains, seas and cities; and when the paladin hungers, Astarotte spreads a table for him in the wilderness or introduces him invisible into the company of queens at banquet in fair Saragossa. The humor and the fancy of this magic journey are both of a high order.[548] Yet Astarotte is made to serve a second purpose. Into his mouth Pulci places all his theological speculations, and makes him reason learnedly like Mephistophilis:
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Of Providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate, Fixed fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute. |
He is introduced in these lines[549]:
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Uno spirto chiamato è Astarotte, Molto savio, terribil, molto fero, Questo si sta giù nell'infernal grotte; Non è spirto folletto, egli è più nero. |
Of his noble descent from the highest of created intelligences Astarotte is well aware[550]: