“The world may talk itself out of existence, before it can hinder me from doing what I conceive to be my duty,” said Felix Bonpre, calmly, “The lad is alone and absolutely friendless,—­it is but fitting and right that I should do what I can for him.”

Abbe Vergniaud sat down, and for a moment appeared absorbed in thought.

“You are a curious man;” he at length observed, “And a more than curious priest!  Here you are, assuming the guardianship of a boy concerning whom you know nothing,—­when you might as well have handed him over to one of the orphanages for the poor, or have paid for his care and education with some of the monastic brethren established near Rouen,—­but no!—­you being eccentric, feel as if you were personally responsible to God for the child, simply because you found him lost and alone, and therefore you have him with you.  It is very good of you,—­we will call it great of you—­but it is not usual.  People will say you have a private motive;—­you must remember that the world never gives you credit for doing a good action simply for the pure sake of doing it,—­’There must be something behind it all,’ they say.  When the worst cocotte of the age begins to lose her beauty, the prospect is so alarming that she thinks there may be a possible hell, after all, and she straightway becomes charitable and renowned for good works;—­precisely in the same way as our famous stage ‘stars’, knowing their lives to be less clean than the lives of their horses and their dogs, give subscriptions and altar-cloths and organs to the clergy.  It is all very amusing!—­I assure you I have often laughed at it.  It is as if they took Heaven by its private ear in confidence, and said, ’See now, I want to put things straight with you if I can!—­and if a few church-ornaments, and candlesticks will pacify you, why, take them and hold your tongue!’”

He paused, but the Cardinal was silent.

“I know,” went on the Abbe, “that you think I am indulging in the worst kind of levity to talk in this way.  It sounds horrible to you.  And you perhaps think I cannot be serious.  My dear Saint Felix, there never was a more serious man than I. I would give worlds—­ universes—­to believe as you do!  I have written books of religious discussion,—­not because I wanted the notice of the world for them,- -for that I do not care about,—­but for the sake of wrestling out the subject for myself, and making my pen my confidant.  I tell you I envy the woman who can say her rosary with the simple belief that the Virgin Mary hears and takes delight in all those repetitions.  Nothing would have given me greater pleasure than to have composed a volume of prayers,—­a ’Garland of Flowers’—­such as an innocent girl could hold in her hands, and bend her sweet eyes over.  It would have been a taste of the sensual-spiritual, or the spiritual-sensual,—­ which is the most exquisite of all human sensations.”

“There is no taint of sensuality in the purely spiritual,” said the Cardinal reprovingly.