“Remember, also, my dear son,” said Father d’Aigrigny, gravely, “that I calmed your scruples, and told you that a priest, who is bound to hear everything under the seal of confession, must be able to know and appreciate everything; and that our Company imposes the task of reading this Compendium, as a classical work, upon young deacons seminarists, and priests, who are destined to be confessors.”

“I believed you, father.  In me the habit of inert obedience was so powerful, and I was so unaccustomed to independent reflection, that, notwithstanding my horror (with which I now reproached myself as with a crime), I took the volume back into my chamber, and read.  Oh, father! what a dreadful revelation of criminal fancies, guilty of guiltiest in their refinement!”

“You speak of this book in blamable terms,” skid Father d’Aigrigny, severely; “you were the victim of a too lively imagination.  It is to it that you must attribute this fatal impression, and not to an excellent work, irreproachable for its special purpose, and duly authorized by the Church.  You are not able to judge of such a production.”

“I will speak of it no more, father,” said Gabriel:  and he thus resumed:  “A long illness followed that terrible night.  Many times, they feared for my reason.  When I recovered, the past appeared to me like a painful dream.  You told me, then, father, that I was not yet ripe for certain functions; and it was then that I earnestly entreated you to be allowed to go on the American missions.  After having long refused my prayer, you at length consented.  From my childhood, I had always lived in the college or seminary, to a state of continual restraint and subjection.  By constantly holding down my head and eyes, I had lost the habit of contemplating the heavens and the splendors of nature.  But, oh! what deep, religious happiness I felt, when I found myself suddenly transported to the centre of the imposing grandeur of the seas-half-way between the ocean and the sky!—­I seemed to come forth from a place of thick darkness; for the first time, for many years, I felt my heart beat freely in my bosom; for the first time, I felt myself master of my own thoughts, and ventured to examine my past life, as from the summit of a mountain, one looks down into a gloomy vale.  Then strange doubts rose within me.  I asked myself by what right, and for what end, any beings had so long repressed, almost annihilated, the exercise of my will, of my liberty, of my reason, since God had endowed me with these gifts.  But I said to myself, that perhaps, one day, the great, beauteous, and holy work, in which I was to have my share, would be revealed to me, and would recompense my obedience and resignation.”

At this moment, Rodin re-entered the room.  Father d’Aigrigny questioned him with a significant look.  The socius approached, and said to him in a low voice, so, that Gabriel could not hear:  “Nothing serious.  It was only to inform me, that Marshal Simon’s father is arrived at M. Hardy’s factory.”