Their religion is corrupted to the core; but in its primitive type, after which its worshippers will sometimes even yet aspire, it is not destitute of a high spirituality that would seek to assimilate and unite men's souls to the Great Being, whom they reverence as the maker, maintainer, and changer of the universe.

ALTÉRER, changer en mal, falsifier, refroidir.

These Italians constituted the great corporation of money-changers in Paris, and hoarded in their coffers all the coin of the kingdom, and in this way caused a perpetual variation in the value of money, by which they themselves benefited.

Half god, half brute, within the self-same shell, Changers with every hour from dawn till even, Who dream with angels in the gate of heaven, And skirt with curious eyes the brinks of hell, Children of Pan, whom some, the few, love well, But most draw back, and know not what to say, Poor shining angels, whom the hoofs betray, Whose pinions frighten with their goatish smell.