"Sugar! It is the Lord's blessing, the incarnation of all that is good and beautiful in the world; once it enters the mouth, it is like the nectar of angels! This is the most sacred gift, white gold, a cure-all elixir!"
On the green coast of Brazil in the New Continent, in the barren colonial camp of Natal, Bruno closed his eyes and recalled the Catholic World's sincere praise for "sugar," the heartfelt adoration of the European aristocracy, and softly recited it aloud.
"Ah! Praise white sugar! Its sweetness can balance the humors of the human body; its luster can purify the murkiness of the soul. It is a symbol of holiness and wealth, a delight that only the noble may taste!..."
Exactly! In the Europe of this era, the vast majority of Catholic nobles, clergy, and wealthy merchants were, without question, true members of the "sweet faction"! As for the remaining ninety-five percent of commoners, they belonged to the lower sort who could not even come into contact with "sugar"!
As the saying went, "First came God, then came heaven; gold and white sugar came even before." In Europe, ruled by the "sweet faction," "sugar," like "Spice," had been endowed with a fourfold halo of "religion, medicine, wealth, and status," august and inviolable.
In religion, "sugar" was sacred, a "white miracle" that soothed the soul; it could be made into a "Holy Sweet Cake," or directly smeared upon a "Saint Statue." In medicine, "sugar" was regarded as a cure-all elixir; no matter what illness one had, the physician would add some "sugar" to the prescription. As for wealth and status, that went without saying! Throughout the entire Middle Ages, "sugar" had been called "white gold," a luxury imported by ship from the mysterious eastern lands. Its price was twenty