We went up and, after we were admitted, some wise men came to meet us. They asked me what was known about conscience in my world.

'Please let us go down,' I replied, 'and summon a number of both laity and clergy who are believed to be wise. We will stand vertically beneath you and question them, so you will hear with your own ears what answers they give.'

This was done, and one of the elect took a trumpet and sounded it to the south, the north, the east and the west. Then after a little while such a crowd gathered that they nearly filled the space of a furlong. But the angels overhead arranged them all into four groups; one of them consisted of politicians, the second of scholars, the third of medical men, the fourth of clergy.

When they were so arranged, we said to them: 'Forgive us for summoning you. The reason is that the angels who are exactly above us are most anxious to know what you thought when you were in your previous world about conscience; and so what you still think about it, since you retain your previous ideas on such matters. It has been reported to the angels that knowledge about conscience is one of the subjects the knowledge of which has been lost in the world.'

[2] After this we began by turning first to the group consisting of politicians. We asked them to say, if they would, what they had thought in their hearts and so continued to think about conscience. They replied to this one after the other. The gist of their replies collectively was that all they knew of conscience was that it was knowing in oneself, and so being conscious of what one intended, thought, did and said.

But we told them: We did not ask about the etymology of the word "conscience", but what conscience is.'

'What is conscience,' was their reply, 'but anxiety arising from fear of future danger to rank or wealth, and to one's reputation as the result of their loss? That anxiety is dispelled by feasts and a few glasses of fine wine, and by conversations about the sports of Venus and her son*.'

[3] 'You are joking,' we said. 'Please tell us whether any of you has experienced any anxiety from other sources.'

'Where else could it be from?' they replied. 'Isn't the whole world like a stage on which each plays his own scene, as comic actors do on their stage? We baffle and get the better of anyone who comes along by means of his own longings, some by making fools of them, some by flattery, some by trickery, some by the pretence of friendship, some by a front of sincerity, and some by our skill as politicians in dangling inducements before them. This gives us no mental anxiety, but on the contrary joviality and gladness, which we fill our lungs with and breathe out silently but to the full. We have indeed heard from some of our colleagues that they are from time to time subject to anxiety and distress, as if affecting the heart and chest, thereby occasioning a sort of cramping of the mind. But on consulting the apothecaries about these, they were told that they are caused by a melancholy humour arising from undigested food in the stomach or from a morbid condition of the spleen. But in some of these cases we have heard of them being restored to their previous joviality by the use of medicines.'

[4] After hearing this we turned to the group composed of scholars, which included a number of experts on physics. We addressed them and said: 'You have studied the sciences and consequently have been thought to be oracles of wisdom; please tell us what conscience is.'

'What sort of a question is this?' they replied. 'We have indeed heard that some people suffer from sadness, grief and anxiety, which affect not only the gastric regions of the body, but also the seat of the mind. For we believe that the two brains are its seat. Since these are composed of adjacent fibres, there is an acrid humour which plucks, bites and gnaws at those fibres, and so contracts the sphere of thoughts in the mind that it is unable to relax to enjoy any of the diversions that come from variety. So it comes about that the person concentrates on only one topic, and this destroys the tensile properties and elasticity of the fibres, thus causing them to become resistant and rigid. This leads to the irregular movement of the animal spirits, known to the medical profession as ataxy, and also to the failure of function which is called loss of consciousness. In short, the mind then lies as if beset by hostile squadrons, and can no more turn one way or the other than a wheel fastened on with nails or a ship stuck fast on a sand-bank. Such distress of mind and consequently constriction of the chest afflicts those whose ruling love suffers loss. If this love is attacked, the fibres of the brain contract, and this contraction prevents the mind from moving freely and seeking its pleasures in various forms. When these people suffer this crisis, each depending upon his temperament, they are subject to delusions of various kinds, dementia and delirium, and some suffer from religious brainstorms, which they call the pangs of conscience.'

[5] After this we turned to the third group composed of medical men, including surgeons and apothecaries. 'Perhaps you,' we said, 'know what conscience is. Is it not a savage pain which grips the head and the substance of the heart, and so the subjacent epigastric and hypogastric regions; or is it something else?'

'Conscience,' they replied, 'is nothing but a pain of that sort. We are better placed than others to know its origins, for there are accidental diseases which attack the organic substances of the body, and of the head too, consequently also the mind, since the mind sits amid the organs of the brain like a spider in the centre of the threads composing its web, and it runs out and back in similar fashion along these. We call these diseases organic, and the ones which recur time and again chronic. But pain of this sort, described to us by invalids as the pain of conscience, is nothing but a hypochondriac disease, which robs primarily the spleen and secondarily the pancreas and the mesentery of their proper functions. From this arise diseases of the stomach, which result in unhealthiness of the humours; for compression occurs around the orifice of the stomach, which is called heartburn. From this arise humours saturated with black, yellow or green bile, which cause blockage of the smallest blood vessels, what are called the capillaries. This leads to cachexy, atrophy and symphysis, as well as false pneumonia due to sluggish catarrh, and ichorous lymph causing corrosion through the whole mass of blood. Similar results ensue from the emission of pus into the blood and its serum as the result of empyemas, abscesses and apostems in the body. When this blood rises through the carotid arteries into the head, it abrades, corrodes and gnaws the medullary, cortical and meningeal substances of the brain, so provoking the pains which are called those of conscience.**

[6] On hearing this we told them: 'You speak the language of Hippocrates and Galen***. This is Greek to us, we don't understand. We did not ask about these diseases, but about conscience, a purely mental matter.'

'The diseases of the mind,' they said, 'and those of the head are the same; and those of the head rise up from the body. For they hang together like two floors of one house connected by a staircase permitting one to go up or down. We know therefore that mental states are indissolubly dependent upon the state of the body. But we have cured those heavinesses or headaches, which we grasp are what you mean by conscience, in some cases by plasters or blistering ointments, in some cases by infusions or emulsions, in some cases by herbal remedies and by anodynes.

[7] So when we heard more of the same from them we turned away and addressed the clergy. 'You,' we said, 'know what conscience is. So tell us and instruct the audience.'

'What conscience is,' they answered, 'is something we know and do not know. We have believed that it is contrition, which precedes election, that is, the moment at which a person is endowed with faith, by means of which he gets a new heart and a new spirit and is regenerated. But we have noticed that few people achieve that contrition; in some cases there is only fear and so anxiety about hell-fire, and hardly anyone worries about his sins and the wrath of God he deserves as a result. But we as confessors have cured them by the Gospel, telling them that Christ by suffering crucifixion removed the sentence of damnation, and so put out hell-fire, opening heaven to all blessed with faith, to which the imputation of the merit of the Son of God is attached. In addition there are people with consciences who belong to various religions, true as well as erroneous, who are scrupulous in matters relating to salvation, not only in essentials, but also in matters of form or of no consequence. Thus, as we said before, we know that conscience exists, but what it is and what true conscience, a wholly spiritual matter, is like, we do not know.'

* i.e. Cupid. ** This passage is full of technical jargon in the original Latin. *** The leading ancient Greek writers on medical subjects.