A private wrong had made the censorious Scaliger more bitter
than usual. In spite of the protection of Castellan, a learned prelate,
Dolet at length suffered in the flames, but whether the charge of Atheism
was well grounded has never been clearly ascertained.
Certainly the pious prayer which he uttered, when the faggots were piled
around him, would seem to exonerate him from such a charge: "My God, whom
I have so often offended, be merciful to me; and I beseech you, O Virgin
Mother, and you, divine Stephen, to intercede with God for me a sinner."
The Parliament of Paris condemned his works as containing "damnable,
pernicious, and heretical doctrines." The Faculty of Theology censured
very severely Dolet's translation of one of the _Dialogues_ of Plato,
entitled _Axiochus_, and especially the passage "Apres la mort, tu ne
seras rien," which Dolet rendered, "Apres la mort, tu ne seras _plus_ rien
_du tout_." The additional words were supposed to convict Dolet of heresy.
He certainly disliked the monks, as the following epigram plainly
declares:--
_Ad Nicolaum Fabricium Valesium
De cucullatis._
"Incurvicervicum cucullatorum habet
Grex id subinde in ore, se esse mortuum
Mundo: tamen edit eximie pecus, bibit
Non pessime, stertit sepultum crapula,
Operam veneri dat, et voluptatum assecla
Est omnium. Idne est mortuum esse mundo?
Aliter interpretare.
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