Eco: Foucalt's Pendulum by eco foucault (ebook smartphone .txt) 📕

or nestle along the bay, churches where the gods of theAfrican pantheon are honored.

Amparo knew a primitiveartist who painted big wooden panels crammed with Biblical andapocalyptic visions, dazzling as a medieval miniature, with Copticand Byzantine elements. Naturally he was a Marxist; he talked aboutthe coming revolution, but he spent his days dreaming in thesacristies of the sanctuary of Nosso Senhor do Bomfim: a triumph ofhorror vacui, scaly with ex-votos that hung from the ceiling andencrusted the walls, a mystical assemblage of silver hearts, woodenarms and legs, images of wondrous rescues from glittering storms,waterspouts, maelstroms. He took us to the sacristy of anotherchurch, which was full of great furnishings redolent of jacaranda."Who is that a painting of?" Amparo asked the sacristan. "SaintGeorge?"

The sacristan gave us aknowing look. "They call him Saint George," he said, "and if youdon't call him that, the pastor gets angry. But he'sOxossi."

For two days the painterled us through naves and cloisters hidden behind decorated fagadeslike silver plates now blackened and worn. Wrinkled, limping famuliaccompanied us. The sacristies were sick with gold and pewter,heavy chests, precious frames. Along the walls, in crystal cases,life-size images of saints towered, dripping blood, their openwounds spattered with ruby droplets; Christs writhed in pain, theirlegs red. In a glow of late-Baroque gold, I saw angels withEtruscan faces, Romanesque griffins, and Oriental sirens peepingout from the capitals.

I moved along ancientstreets, enchanted by names that sounded like songs: Rua da Agonia,Avenida dos Amores, Tra-vessa de Chico Diabo. Our visit to Salvadortook place during a period when the local government, or someoneacting in its name, was trying to renew the old city, and wasclosing down the thousands of brothels. But the project was only atmidpoint. At the feet of those deserted and leprous churchesembarrassed by their own evil-smelling alleys, fifteen-year-oldblack prostitutes still swarmed, ancient women selling Africansweets crouched along the sidewalks with their steaming pots, andhordes of pimps danced amid trickles of sewage to the sound oftransistor radios in nearby bars. The ancient palaces of thePortuguese settlers, surmounted by coats of arms now illegible, hadbecome houses of ill-repute.

On the third day, ourguide took us to the bar of a hotel in a renovated part of theupper city, on a street full of luxury antique shops. He was tomeet an Italian gentleman, he told us, who wanted to buy¡Xand forthe asking price¡Xa painting of his, three meters by two, in whichteeming angelic hosts waged the final battle against the opposinglegions.

And so we met SignorAglie. Impeccably dressed in a double-breasted pin-striped suitdespite the heat, he wore gold-rimmed eyeglasses and had a rosycomplexion, silver hair. He kissed Amparo's hand as if he knew ofno other way to greet a lady, and he ordered champagne. When thepainter had to leave, Aglifc handed him a pack of traveler's checksand said to send the picture to his hotel. We stayed on to chat.Aglie spoke Portuguese correctly, but it sounded as if he hadlearned it in Lisbon. This accent made him seem even more like agentleman of bygone days. He asked about us, commented on thepossible Genevan origin of my name, and expressed curiosity aboutAmparo's family history, though somehow he had already guessed thatthe main branch was from Recife. About his own origins he wasvague. "I'm like many people here," he said. "Countless races arerepresented in my genes...The name is Italian, from the ancientestate of an ancestor. Perhaps a nobleman, but who cares thesedays? It was curiosity that brought me to Brazil. All forms oftradition fascinate me."

He told us he had a finelibrary of religious sciences in Milan, where he had been livingfor some years. "Come and see me when you get back. I have a numberof interesting things, from Afro-Brazilian rites to the Isis cultsof the late Roman Empire." "I adore the Isis cults," Amparo said,who often, out of pride, pretended to be silly. "You must knoweverything there is to know about them."

Aglie replied modestly:"Only what little IVe seen of them." Amparo tried again: "Butwasn't it two thousand years ago?" "I'm not as young as you are."Aglie smiled.

"Like Cagliostro," Ijoked. "Wasn't he the one who was heard to murmur to his attendantas they passed a crucifix, ¡¥I told that Jew to be careful thatevening, but he just wouldn't listen'?"

Aglie stiffened. AfraidI had offended him, I started to apologize, but our host stopped mewith an indulgent smile. "Cagliostro was a humbug. It's commonknowledge when and where he was born, and he didn't even manage tolive very long. A braggart."

"I don't doubtit."

"Cagliostro was ahumbug," Aglie repeated, "but that does not mean that there havenot been¡Xand still are¡Xprivileged persons who have lived manylives. Modern science knows so little about the aging process. It'squite possible that mortality is simply the result of pooreducation. Cagliostro was a humbug, but the Comte de Saint-Germainwas not. He may not have been boasting when he claimed to havelearned some of his chemical secrets from the ancient Egyptians.Nobody believed him, so out of politeness to his listeners hepretended to be joking."

"And now you pretend tobe joking in order to convince us you're telling the truth," Amparosaid.

"You are not onlybeautiful, but extraordinarily perceptive too," Aglie said. "But Ibeseech you, do not believe me. Were I to appear before you in thedusty splendor of my many centuries, your own beauty would wither,and I could never forgive myself.''

Amparo was conquered,and I felt a twinge of jealousy. I changed the subject to churches,and to the Saint George-Oxossi we had seen. Aglie said weabsolutely had to attend a candom-ble". "Not one where they chargeadmission. They let you into the real ones without asking anythingof you. You don't even have to be a believer. You must observerespectfully, of course, showing the same tolerance of all faithsas they do in accepting your unbelief. At first sight a pai ormae-de-santo might seem to be straight out of Uncle Tom's Cabin,but they have as much culture as a Vatican theologian."

Amparo put her hand onhis. "Take us!" she said. "I went to one many years ago, in a tendade umbanda, but I can't recall much about it. All I remember isgreat