the ways of cities; here indeed was matter for excitement. Yet it was an
excitement not altogether pleasurable; for with my very natural curiosity,
and with my eagerness to have it gratified, were blended certain fears
imbibed from the only quality of reading that had been mine.

The world was an evil place in which temptations seethed, and through which
it was difficult to come unscathed. Therefore, I feared the world and the
adventuring beyond the shelter of the walls of the castle of Mondolfo; and
yet I desired to judge for myself the evil of which I read, the evil which
in moments of doubt I even permitted myself to question.

My reasoning followed the syllogism that God being good and God having
created the world, it was not possible that the creation should be evil.
It was well enough to say that the devil was loose in it. But that was not
to say that the devil had created it; and it would be necessary to prove
this ere it could be established that it was evil in itself--as many
theologians appeared to seek to show--and a place to be avoided.

Such was the question that very frequently arose in my mind, ultimately to
be dismissed as a lure of Satan's to imperil my poor soul. It battled for
existence now amid my fears; and it gained some little ascendancy.

"And whither am I to go?" I asked. "To Pavia, or to the University of
Bologna?"

"Had my advice been heeded," said he, "one or the other would have been
your goal. But your mother took counsel with Messer Arcolano."

He shrugged, and there was contempt in the lines of his mouth. He
distrusted Arcolano, the regular cleric who was my mother's confessor and