ther was preferved by a kind of miracle, to atone, as fhe did in a dungeon, for her wickedness. They add, that, to perpetuate the memory of fuch an extraordinary adventure, a little chapel was built, and a ftatue erected, in the place where it happened, both to the mother and the child; and that, in deteftation of the fact, the Popes and the Roman clergy have ever fince, in their proceffions from the Vatican to the Lateran, turned off from that ftreet, chufing rather to go a good way about, than to pass through fo infamous a place. Not fatisfied with thus fhewing their deteftation and abhorrence of fuch a fcandalous impofition, to prevent their being thus imposed upon for the future, they introduced the immodeft cuftom of placing the new Pope on a perforated ftool, before he was ordained, and obliging the youngest deacon to fatisfy himself and them, that the perfon they had chofen was not a woman; Mas eft, cried the deacon, and the clergy answered, Deo gratias.

Such is the account they give us of the birth, education, adventures, and unhappy end of the celebrated Pope Joan. But it is to be observed, that of none of the various circumstances and incidents, with which they have embellished her ftory, has the least notice been taken by Marianus Scotus, who flourished two hundred years after her time, and is supposed to have been the firft that mentioned her. All he faid of her, if he said fo much, was, that "to Leo IV. fucceeded Joan, a woman, who held the See two years, five months, and four days." Whatever elfe we read of her, has been added by writers who lived, fome one, fome two, fome three, and fome four hundred years after Marianus, and may confequently be looked upon as fabulous.'

Mr. Bower goes on to examine the fact in queftion, abftracting from the circumftances with which later Writers have embellished it, and only enquires, whether Leo IV. was fucceeded by Joan, a woman? He concludes what he fays upon this fubject in the following manner.

Who was the inventor of this fable, or by whom it was firft related, is uncertain, it being by fome charged upon Marianus Scotus, by fome upon Sigebert, and by fome upon Vincentius Bellovacenfis, or Martinus Polonus; while others pretend no mention to be made of the female Pope in the more antient manuscript copies of thefe Writers. But whoever was the first author of that tale, it was, in procefs of time, embellifhed with many circumftances, or curious anecdotes, unknown to thofe who had firft related it. In the copies of Marianus, where mention is made of Pope Joan, no more is said than that "Joan, a woman, fucceeded Pope Leo IV. during the fpace of two years, five months, and four days;" but by thofe

who

who wrote after him, we are told, as has been obferved above, that the She-Pope was delivered of a fon in the public street, between the church of St. Clement and the Colifeo, or the amphitheatre of Titus; that thenceforth the folemn proceffions have ever avoided the fame ftreet; that a marble statue was erected there, in deteftation of such an event; and that the perforated chair was, from that time forward, made ufe of, to prevent the like miftake in the election of the Pope. But it does not appear, that the folemn proceffions ever paffed through that street; and if they did, it was for other reasons, perhaps because it was too narrow, that they afterwards took another way. We cannot doubt that a ftatue was to be seen in the place where Joan was fuppofed to have been delivered of her fon, being affured by Theodoric of Neim, who paffed the best part of his time in Rome, and was fecretary to two Popes, that it was ftill extant at the time that he wrote, that is, in 1413. But from thence we cannot conclude the ftory to be true, but only that it was believed when the ftatue was erected; as it was believed when the ftatue of the She-Pope was placed in the cathedral of Siena, among thofe of the Popes from St. Peter to Pius II. and placed between Leo IV. and Benedict III. with this infcription, Joan VIII. an English woman. In Baronius's time this ftatue was ftill to be feen in the cathedral of Siena; but Cardinal Tarugi, Archbishop of that city, applying to the Grand Duke, at his requeft the features were altered by his royal highnefs, and the flatue of Pope Joan was metamorphofed into that of Pope Zachary; but as all knew that it had once reprefented the female Pope, it was broken or removed, before the year 1677, to abolish her very memory. As for the perforated chair, three chairs were formerly made ufe of in the inftallation of the Pope: the first was of white marble, stood in the porch of the Lateran church, and was not perforated; the other two were of porphyry, were both perforated, and they stood before the chapel of St. Silvefter, in the fame church. In the first of these chairs the new Pope was placed, after he had been acknowleged by the Cardinals; and while he rose from it, the feventh and eighth verfes of the 113th Pfalm were fung in Latin, Sufcitat de pulvere egenum, et de ftercore erigit pauperem, &c. and from thence the chair took the name of Stercoraria. From that the Pope was attended by the Cardinals to the two other chairs, was placed in both; and while he fat in the one, the keys of the Lateran church were delivered to him by the Prior of St. Laurence, and he returned them to him while he fat in the other. The reader will find this ceremony described in verfe by a cardinal, in a poem he wrote on the coronation of Boniface VIII. At what time, or by whom, the use of these chairs was first introduced, we know not. Cencius, who wrote Z

Rev. April, 1759.

in

In the twelfth century, is the first who mentions them; but it is not certain that notice was taken by any Writer before the fifteenth century, of the ufe that was then faid to have been made of them, viz. to know whether the perfon they had chofen was a man or a woman. The chairs, especially the two perforated ones, are thought by learned antiquaries to have been ufed by the Romans (for they are antient) in their hot baths; and they are faid to have been discovered in the ruins of those baths. As the placing of the new chofen Pope in them confirmed the ignorant people in the belief of the fable of the ShePope, it was thought advifeable to abolish that ceremony; it was accordingly abolifhed in the fixteenth century.

The female Pope owes her exiftence and her promotion to the Roman Catholics themselves; for by them that fable was invented, was published to the world by their priests and monks before the reformation, and was credited, upon their authority, even by thofe who were moft zealously attached to the holy See, and among the reft by St. Antoninus, archbishop of Florence; nor did they begin to confute it till Proteftants reproached them with it, as reflecting great difhonour on the See of St. Peter. Eneas Silvius, afterwards Pope Pius II. in the fifteenth century, was the first who queftioned the truth of the fact, faying, That the story was not certain. After him, Aventinus, who was a Lutheran in his heart, abfolutely denied it, and many others undertook to confute it; but none, perhaps, with better fuccefs than the two Proteftant Writers, Sarau and Blondel, who have alleged fuch reafons againft the exiftence of the She-Pope, as are abfolutely unanswerable: and, indeed, had they not been convinced themselves of the falfity of the fact, no man can think that two fuch zealous Proteftants would have taken fo much pains to convince others.

Various conjectures have been offered, by those who have thought it worth their while, to enquire into the origin of this fable: fome fay, with Baronius, that John VIII. betrayed fo much cowardice in the cause of Photius, as I fhall have occafion to relate hereafter, that it was thought he should rather be called a woman than a man. Aventinus will have the fable to have taken its rife from the election of Pope John IX. raised to the See by the intereft of Theodora, a noble and imperious courtezan. Onuphrius Panvinius is of opinion, that Joan Rainiere, another famous courtezan, who governed John XII. as well as the state, with an uncontrouled power, was called in raillery the She-Pope. Many other conjectures have been alleged concerning the origin of a fable, that was for fo long a time and fo univerfally credited; but, as they are only conjectures, Ifhall not trouble the reader with them, the ftory of a female Pope being

now

now generally, not to fay univerfally, rejected by men of learning, whether Proteftants or Papifts, as an event first mentioned by Writers who flourished two hundred years at least after the fact in queftion, and abfolutely irreconcileable with indifputable facts related by cotemporary Hiftorians.'

R

A Treatife of Fluxions.

FLU

By Ifrael Lyons, junior. 8vo. 75.
Millar.

LUXIONS being found very commodious for the difcovery of new theorems in the mathematics, as the Author in his preface obferves, he has endeavoured to facilitate the knowlege of this method, by proving it in an eafy and concise manner, and applying it to the different problems concerning curve-lines. His performance is, in general, a very good one, and deferves the perufal of the curious Reader, efpecially with regard to the application of fluxions to the feveral problems relating to curvelines; fome of which are treated with a clearness and perfpicuity to be met with in no other Writer. But as we conceive that the Author has not equally fucceeded in the demonstrations of the principal propofitions on which the evidence of this method depends, we cannot help taking notice of fome few blemishes to be met with in them; and this not with a view to depreciate the Author's knowlege, which he has fo well manifefted throughout the whole work, but to endeavour, as far as we are able, to fet the principles of this noble fcience in the cleareft light.

The Author's first and fundamental propofition runs thus, The indefinitely fmall fpaces defcribed in equal indefinitely fmall times, are as the velocities.' The phrafe indefinitely (mall is too vague to convey a distinct idea to the reader's mind; and does not admit a determined fenfe, fuch as is required in a demonftration, where no word is to be ufed but what conveys a pofitive idea and that this propofition is not ftrictly true, but only nearly fo, appears from what Sir Iaac Newton obferves, in his introduction to the quadrature of curves; where, after the definition of fluxions, he fays, that they are nearly as the cotemporary increments, or, to speak more accurately, in the nafcent ratio in which these increments begin to exift, or in the evanefcent ratio in which the decrements vanith. The ratio of the velocities, or fluxions, can, therefore, not be expreffed by the increments or decrements themfelves, let them be ever so small.

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1. An ingenious young Gentleman of the University of Cambridge.

It is a matter of furprize, notwithstanding Sir Ifaac fo carefully avoided all ambiguous terms, and equivocal expreffions, thac most Writers on this fubject, and even thofe of the greatest reputation, have yet been guilty of the erroneous expreffions, to express the fluxions by infinitely small spaces, and taking an infinitely Small are of a curve for a right line, by which they render Sir Ifaac's ftrict demonftrations liable to the fame exceptions as the method of infiniment petits, used by foreigners. We are, indeed, fo far from thinking that the commentators on Sir Ifaac's works have explained or illuftrated his concife manner of reafoning, as they pretend, that we conceive, on the contrary, they have neglected his accuracy, and fubftituted unintelligible phrafes, by which the elements of this fublime fcience have been cenfured as obfcure, and ungeometrical.

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Our Author's method of drawing tangents, and finding the fluxions of areas, furfaces, folids, and of curve-lines, are liable to the fame exceptions as his firft propofition. For in article 108, fig. 12, he fays, Let op be an ordinate infinitely near OP, and draw Pn parallel to AO; then the triangles TOP, Pup, will be fimilar. Here he takes it for granted, that np exprefles the increment of OP, although it is evident by inspection, that np is either greater than that increment, when the curve bends inward, or lefs when it bends outward: and in article 116, 230, he takes the part Pp of the tangent for the increment of the arc AP; although it is greater or lefs than that_increment, according as the curve bends inward or outward. In art. 202, fig. 58. he takes the rectangle opqw for the fluxion or space opw, without the leaft proof; the fame thing is fuppofed in article 271.

• Propofition VI. Having the relation of the fluents, to find the relation of the fluxions." Here the Author, by way of preparation, fays, Let all the terms of the equation expreffing the relation of the fluents, be brought to one fide, and made equal to nothing;' by which the Reader is led to believe, that the fluxions cannot be found without this preparation: whereas the fluxion of the equation x3-axy-axy is found with equal cafe without it: and the fame thing is true in all other cafes; nor can the Author fhew any inftance, wherein it renders the operation easier. In art. 24, it appears quite needlefs to multiply the equation x3-ax2=y3-axy by "y, in order to find the various forms of the relation of its fluxions; fince all thofe given in article 25 are not in the least shorter, nor more commodious, than that found before, without this long and tedious operation. The fame thing happens in all the examples given upon that head. As to the example in article 28, there needs

not