ieur! and he had a female who was called Mademoiselle! I
wonder how authors of such great character should write so absurdly on
his vanishing at his death, nobody knows how!" But as it is probable
that Monsieur and Mademoiselle must have generated some puppy demons,
Wierus ought to have been more circumstantial.

Albertus Magnus, for thirty years, had never ceased working at a man of
brass, and had cast together the qualities of his materials under
certain constellations, which threw such a spirit into his man of
brass, that it was reported his growth was visible; his feet, legs,
thighs, shoulders, neck, and head, expanded, and made the city of
Cologne uneasy at possessing one citizen too mighty for them all. This
man of brass, when he reached his maturity, was so loquacious, that
Albert's master, the great scholastic Thomas Aquinas, one day, tired of
his babble, and declaring it was a devil, or devilish, with his staff
knocked the head off; and, what was extraordinary, this brazen man, like
any human being thus effectually silenced, "word never spake more." This
incident is equally historical and authentic; though whether heads of
brass can speak, and even prophesy, was indeed a subject of profound
inquiry even at a later period.[199] Naude, who never questioned their
vocal powers, and yet was puzzled concerning the nature of this new
species of animal, has no doubt most judiciously stated the question,
Whether these speaking brazen heads had a sensitive and reasoning
nature, or whether demons spoke in them? But brass has not the faculty
of providing its own nourishment, as we see in plants, and therefore
they were not sensitive; and as for the act of reasoning, these brazen
heads presumed to know nothing but the future: with the past and the
present they seemed totally unacquainted, so that their memory and their
observation were very limited; and as for the future, that is always
doubtful and obscure--even to heads of brass! This learned man then
infers that "These brazen heads could have no reasoning faculties, for
nothing altered their nature; they said what they had to say, which no
one could contradict; and having said their say, you might have broken
the head for anything more that you could have got out of it. Had they
had any life in them, would they not have moved as well as spoken? Life
itself is but motion, but they had no lungs, no spleen; and, in fact,
though they spoke, they had no tongue. Was a devil in