Sacra sub extremâ, si forte requiritis, horâ
Cur Leo non potuit sumere; vendiderat.
"Do you ask why Leo did not take the sacrament on his
death-bed?--How could he? He had sold it!"
Many of these satirical touches depend on puns. Urban VII., one of the
_Barberini_ family, pillaged the Pantheon of brass to make cannon,[63]
on which occasion Pasquin was made to say:--
Quod non fecerunt _Barbari_ Romæ, fecit _Barberini_.
On Clement VII., whose death was said to be occasioned by the
prescriptions of his physician:--
Curtius occidit Clementem; Curtius auro
Donandus, per quem publica parta salus.
"Dr. Curtius has killed the pope by his remedies; he ought to be
remunerated as a man who has cured the state."