Editorial note — NOTES.
Reading edition
Several learned divines, with much appearance of reason, in particular Dr. Lardner, have maintained that the common notion respecting the dissolute life of Mary Magdalen is erroneous, and that she was always a person of excellent character. Charles Taylor, the editor of Calmet's Dictionary of the Bible, takes the same view of the subject.
The verses of the Spanish poet here translated refer to the[Page 268] "woman who had been a sinner," mentioned in the seventh chapter of St. Luke's Gospel, and who is commonly confounded with Mary Magdalen.