From that time forth he renounced a better world, and never uncovered himself when a Name was pronounced, and for him the carven saints in the churches became works of art.  He understood the mechanism of society too well to clash wantonly with its prejudices; for, after all, he was not as powerful as the executioner, but he evaded social laws with the wit and grace so well rendered in the scene with M. Dimanche.  He was, in fact, Moliere’s Don Juan, Goethe’s Faust, Byron’s Manfred, Mathurin’s Melmoth—­great allegorical figures drawn by the greatest men of genius in Europe, to which Mozart’s harmonies, perhaps, do no more justice than Rossini’s lyre.  Terrible allegorical figures that shall endure as long as the principle of evil existing in the heart of man shall produce a few copies from century to century.  Sometimes the type becomes half-human when incarnate as a Mirabeau, sometimes it is an inarticulate force in a Bonaparte, sometimes it overwhelms the universe with irony as a Rabelais; or, yet again, it appears when a Marechal de Richelieu elects to laugh at human beings instead of scoffing at things, or when one of the most famous of our ambassadors goes a step further and scoffs at both men and things.  But the profound genius of Juan Belvidero anticipated and resumed all these.  All things were a jest to him.  His was the life of a mocking spirit.  All men, all institutions, all realities, all ideas were within its scope.  As for eternity, after half an hour of familiar conversation with Pope Julius II. he said, laughing: 

“If it is absolutely necessary to make a choice, I would rather believe in God than in the Devil; power combined with goodness always offers more resources than the spirit of Evil can boast.”

“Yes; still God requires repentance in this present world——­”

“So you always think of your indulgences,” returned Don Juan Belvidero.  “Well, well, I have another life in reserve in which to repent of the sins of my previous existence.”

“Oh, if you regard old age in that light,” cried the Pope, “you are in danger on canonization——­”

“After your elevation to the Papacy nothing is incredible.”  And they went to watch the workmen who were building the huge basilica dedicated to Saint Peter.

“Saint Peter, as the man of genius who laid the foundation of our double power,” the Pope said to Don Juan, “deserves this monument.  Sometimes, though, at night, I think that a deluge will wipe all this out as with a sponge, and it will be all to begin over again.”

Don Juan and the Pope began to laugh; they understood each other.  A fool would have gone on the morrow to amuse himself with Julius II. in Raphael’s studio or at the delicious Villa Madama; not so Belvidero.  He went to see the Pope as pontiff, to be convinced of any doubts that he (Don Juan) entertained.  Over his cups the Rovere would have been capable of denying his own infallibility and of commenting on the Apocalypse.