“You have found words of our Lord which will express what we have seen to-day?” he asked.

“Yes,” replied Manuel, and he read in a clear vibrating tone, “Woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because ye build the tombs of the prophets and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous.”  Here he paused and said, while the Cardinal gazed at him wonderingly, “Is not that true of Paris?  There is their great Pantheon where most of their prophets lie,—­their poets and their teachers whom they wronged and slandered in their lifetime—­”

“My child,” interrupted Bonpre gently, “Poets and so-called teachers are not always good men.  One named Voltaire, who scoffed at God, and enunciated the doctrine of materialism in France, is buried there.”

“Nevertheless he also was a prophet,” persisted Manuel, in his quiet, half-childlike, half-scholarly way, “A prophet of evil.  He was the incarnation of the future spirit of Paris.  He lived as a warning of what was to come,—­a warning of the wolves that were ready to descend upon the Master’s fold.  But Paris was then perhaps in the care of those ‘hirelings’ who are mentioned here as caring not for the sheep.”

He turned a few pages and continued reading.

“’Well hath Esais prophesied of you, hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips but their heart is far from me.  Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrine the commandments of man.’”

He emphasised the last few words and looked up at the Cardinal, then he went on.

“’Whosoever will come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.  For whosoever will save his life shall lose it, but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake the same shall save it.’”

“Yes,” said Cardinal Bonpre fervently, “It is all there!—­’Whosoever will come after me let him deny himself,’ let him deny himself!  That is the secret of it.  Self-denial!  And this age is one of self-indulgence.  We are on the wrong road, all of us, both Church and laity,—­and if the Master should come He will not find us watching, but sleeping.”

He broke off, as at that moment a knock came at the door and a servant entered the room bringing him a letter.  It was from the Abbe Vergniaud, and ran as follows:—­

“TRES cher MONSIGNEUR!  I preach the day after tomorrow at Notre Dame de Lorette, and if you wish to do a favour to a dying man you will come and hear me.  I am moved to say things I have never said before, and it is possible I may astonish and perchance scandalise Paris.  What inspires me I do not know,—­perhaps your well-deserved reproach of the other day—­perhaps the beautiful smile of the angel that dwells in Donna Sovrani’s eyes,—­perhaps the chance meeting with your Rouen foundling on the stairs as I was flying away from your just wrath.  He had been gathering roses