They cheat, steal, and fornicate, and when they are at the end of their resources, they set up as saints and work miracles . . . bring with them confederates who pretend to be blind or afflicted with some mortal disease, and after touching the hem of the monk's cowl, or the relics which he carries, are healed before the eyes of the multitude. All then shout 'Misericordia', the bells are rung, and the miracle is recorded in a solemn protocol. ... The nuns ... bring forth pretty little monks or else use means to hinder that result. And if anyone charges me with falsehood, let him search the nunneries well, and he will find there as many little bones as in Bethlehem at Herod's time. ... The best punishment for them would be for God to abolish Purgatory; they would then receive no more alms, and would be forced to go back to their spades.
-- Tommaso Guardati, aka Masuccio Salernitano (1410-1475), quoted in Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (London: Phaidon, 1945), 283f.
