rows any certain light on the subject.

Footnotes:

[450] 1 John xii. 2.

[451] 2 Kings viii. 5.

CHAPTER III.

REVIVAL OF A MAN WHO HAD BEEN INTERRED FOR THREE YEARS, AND WAS
RESUSCITATED BY ST. STANISLAUS.

All the lives of the saints are full of resurrections of the dead;
thick volumes might be composed on the subject.

These resurrections have a manifest relation to the matter which we
are here treating of, since it relates to persons who are dead, or
held to be so, who appear bodily and animated to the living, and who
live after their return to life. I shall content myself with relating
the history of St. Stanislaus, Bishop of Cracow, who restored to life
a man that had been dead for three years, attended by such singular
circumstances, and in so public a manner, that the thing is beyond the
severest criticism. If it is really true, it must be regarded as one
of the most unheard of miracles which are read of in history. They
assert that the life of this saint was written either at the time of
martyrdom,[452] or a short time afterwards, by different well-informed
authors; for the martyrdom of the saint, and, above all, the
restoration to life of the dead man of whom we are about to speak,
were seen and known by an infinite number of persons, by all the court
of king Boleslaus. And this event having taken place in Poland, where
vampires are frequently met with even in our days, it concerns, for
that reason, more particularly the subject we are treating.

The bishop, St. Stanislaus, having bought of a gentleman, named
Pierre, an estate situated on the banks of the Vistula, in the
territory of Lublin, for the profit of his church at Cracow, gave the
price of it to the seller, in the presence of witnesses, and with the
solemnities requisite in that country, but without written deeds, for
they then wrote but seldom in Poland on the occasion of sales of this
kind; they contented themselves with having witnesses. Stanislaus took
possession of this estate by the king's authority, and his church
enjoyed it peaceably for about three years.

In the interim, Pierre, who had sold it, happened to die. The king of
Poland, Boleslaus, who had conceived an implacable hatred against the
holy bishop, because he had freely reproved him for his excesses,
seeking occasion to cause him trouble, excited against him the three
sons of Pierre, and his heirs, and told them to claim the estate which
their father had sold, o