“’The different apartments of the house shall then be opened to them.  They will see in them divers objects, well worthy of interest, pity, and respect—­particularly in the Hall of Mourning.

“’My desire is, that the house may not be sold, but that it may remain furnished as it is, and serve as a place of meeting for my descendants, if, as I hope, they attend to my last wishes.

“’If, on the contrary, they are divided amongst themselves—­if, instead of uniting for one of the most generous enterprises that ever signalized an age, they yield to the influence of selfish passions—­if they prefer a sterile individuality to a fruitful association—­if, in this immense fortune, they see only an opportunity for frivolous dissipation, or sordid interest—­may they be accursed by all those whom they might have loved, succored, and disfettered!—­and then let this house be utterly demolished and destroyed, and the papers, of which Isaac Samuel possesses the inventory, as well as the two portraits in the Red Room, be burnt by the guardian of the property.

“’I have spoken.  My duty is accomplished.  In all this, I have followed the counsels of the man whom I revere and love as the image of God upon earth.

“’The faithful friend, who preserved for me the fifty thousand crowns, the wreck of my fortune, knows the use I mean to make of them.  I could not refuse his friendship this mark of confidence.  But I have concealed from him the name of Isaac Samuel—­for to have mentioned it might have exposed this latter and his descendants to great dangers.

“’In a short time, this friend, who knows not that my resolution to die is so near its accomplishment, will come hither with my notary.  Into their hands, after the usual formalities, I shall deliver my sealed testament.

“’Such is my last will.  I leave its execution to the superintending care of Providence.  God will protect the cause of love, peace, union, and liberty.

“’This mystic testament,[20] having been freely made by me, and written entirely with my own hand, I intend and will its scrupulous execution both in spirit and the letter.

“’This 13th day of February, 1682, at one o’clock in the afternoon.

“‘Mariusde Rennepont.’”

As the notary had proceeded with the reading of the testament, Gabriel was successively agitated by divers painful impressions.  At first, as we have before said, he was struck with the singular fatality which restored this immense fortune, derived from a victim of the Society of Jesus, to the hands of that very association, by the renewal of his deed of gift.  Then, as his charitable and lofty soul began fully to comprehend the admirable tendency of the association so earnestly recommended by Marius de Rennepont, he reflected with bitter remorse, that, in consequence of his act of renunciation, and of the absence of any other heir, this great idea would never be realized,