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Isabella
Father Jerome is a devout, intelligent, and kind-hearted friar in one of Otranto’s two convents. As Manfred’s foil, he constantly urges the prince to renounce his thirst for worldly power and to take up faith. Jerome sees through Manfred’s attempts to manipulate him and attempts to deceive Manfred to protect Isabella. When this results in Theodore’s death sentence, it sets in a motion a series of events in which Jerome sees a mark on Theodore’s shoulder, realizes that Theodore is his long lost son, and reveals his own past identity as the Count of Falconara. After Manfred kills Matilda, Jerome reveals that Theodore has a stronger claim to the throne than Frederic, because Jerome’s wife (Theodore’s mother) was Alfonso’s daughter. Throughout the story, Jerome acts as a true man of faith and goodness, working to protect others and counseling against greed and lust.
Father Jerome Quotes in The Castle of Otranto
The The Castle of Otranto quotes below are all either spoken by Father Jerome or refer to Father Jerome. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 2 Quotes
“Father,” interrupted Manfred, “I pay due reverence to your holy profession; but I am sovereign here, and will allow no meddling priest to interfere in the affairs of my domestic. If you have aught to say, attend me to my chamber—I do not use to let my wife be acquainted with the secret affairs of my state; they are not within a woman’s province.”
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Interrupting Jerome from telling Hippolita of his wrongdoings, Manfred asserts that priests and woman have no place in the political sphere, and asks to speak to Jerome alone. As he will do again and again in his conversations with Jerome throughout the novel, Manfred insists on a separation between church and state, a separation which, in the world of the novel, is shown to be against divine will. Just as he declares that his wife should have no say in his rule, Manfred argues that a mere priest has no authority over him. However, unlike Hippolita who submits easily to Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque o
“Holy father,” said Hippolita, “it is your office to be no respecter of persons: you must speak as your duty prescribes—but it is my duty to hear nothing that it pleases not my lord I should hear.”
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After Manfred declares that it is not Hippolita’s place as a woman to listen to what he does not wish her to hear, Hippolita folds easily, submitting to her husband’s desires. However, like Manfred, she makes the mistake of implicitly supporting a separation between church and state, or in her case, church and everyday life. By speaking of Jerome’s obligations to God and her own duties to her husband as if they are comparable, Hippolita implies that her worldly duties as a wife, rather than her moral obligations as a Christian, are of the utmost importance to her. Only at Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut ven
Chapter 4 Quotes
“Come, come,” resumed the friar, “inconsiderate youth, this must not be; eradicate this guilty passion from thy breast.”—“Guilty passion!” cried Theodore, “Can guilt dwell with innocent beauty and virtuous modesty?”—“It is sinful,” replied the friar, “to cherish those whom heaven has doomed to destruction. A tyrant’s race must be swept from the earth to the third and fourth generation.”
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Shortly before Hippolita seeks Jerome’s advice about a marriage between Frederic and Matilda, Jerome is advising his son to relinquish his love for Matilda. Jerome’s warning against “guilty passion” reinforces the novel’s previous implications that romantic love is a corrupting force.Jerome’s declaration that it is sinful to love a “a tyrant’s race,” which is doomed for destruction, originates from the Bible. In his first preface to Otranto, Walpole, posing as the story’s fictional translator, criticizes the fictional Italian “author” of story, Onuphrio Muralto, for using this Bible quote on the grounds that it as an ineffective moral for the story Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque placeat. Molestiae earum eum. Libero sit beatae. At a
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Father Jerome Character Timeline in The Castle of Otranto
The timeline below shows where the character Father Jerome appears in The Castle of Otranto. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 2
...with the news that Isabella has sought sanctuary at St. Nicholas’s church and that Father Jerome of the church is now informing Manfred, who is in Hippolita’s room. The narrator jumps...
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Jerome then passes along a message from Isabella to both Manfred and Hippolita, affirming her compassion...
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Now in his own room, Manfred has a private discussion with Jerome and claims that his attempt to rape Isabella was motivated by “reasons of state.” He...
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Seething over the false information Jerome gave him, Manfred has the peasant brought from his room to the great hall for...
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When Jerome arrives as a confessor, he realizes that he inadvertently put Theodore in danger. Remorseful, he...
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Chapter 3
Shaken by the helmet’s moving feathers, Manfred seeks an explanation from Jerome, who says that Manfred has angered heaven and must submit himself to the church. At...
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Once Jerome is ushered out and Manfred imprisons Theodore in a tower, the herald announces the reason...
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...continues to talk and begins to discuss his marriage to Hippolita. As he did with Jerome, he claims that his supposedly incestuous marriage has troubled him and that in order to...
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At that moment, Jerome and his fellow friars arrive at the castle, interrupting Manfred’s speech. Jerome then reveals to...
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Theodore goes to one of the church’s convents to tell Jerome that he is free, but when he arrives he discovers that Jerome is elsewhere and...
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Chapter 4
...for Alfonso. When Manfred realizes it is Theodore, he is furious that Theodore escaped. Assuming Jerome helped him, Manfred demands to know how Theodore came to be separated from and then...
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Hippolita then finds Jerome in the church, seeking his guidance about the morality of a divorce. At that moment,...
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While Hippolita is conversing with Jerome, up at the castle Manfred is proposing to Frederic that they marry each other’s daughters....
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Chapter 5
...rocks and the giant helmet clamors. Believing the end of days is here, Frederic and Jerome rush out to the court, dragging Theodore behind them. As soon as Theodore steps out,...
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Jerome then completes the story by recounting Alfonso’s secret past. Before Alfonso fought in the crusades,...
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