Lisbed (weeping).  Oh, my heart, do say that it is flat!

Jeronimus.  Out, out of the door!

[Exeunt Jeronimus, Magdelone, and Lisbed.]

ACT IV

SCENE I

(Before Jeppe’s House.)

Montanus.  Here I have been worried for a good hour by my parents, who with sighing and weeping try to persuade me to give up my opinions; but they don’t know Erasmus Montanus.  Not if I were to be made an emperor for it would I renounce what I once have said.  I love Mademoiselle Elisabet, to be sure; but that I should sacrifice philosophy for her sake, and repudiate what I have publicly maintained—­that is out of the question.  I hope, though, that it will all come out right, and that I shall win my sweetheart without losing my reputation.  Once I get a chance to talk to Jeronimus, I can convince him of his errors so conclusively that he will agree to the match.  But there are the deacon and the bailiff, coming from my father- and mother-in-law’s.

SCENE 2

(Enter Peer and Jesper.)

Jesper.  My dear Monsieur Montanus, we have been working hard for you this day.

Montanus.  What’s that?

Jesper.  We have intervened between your parents and your parents-in-law to bring about a reconciliation.

Montanus.  Well, what have you accomplished?  Did my father-in-law give way?

Jesper.  The last words he said to us were, “There has never been any heresy in our family.  You tell Rasmus Berg”—­I merely quote his words; he never once said Montanus Berg—­“You tell Rasmus Berg from me,” said he, “that my wife and I are both honest, God-fearing people, who would rather wring our daughter’s neck than marry her to any one who says that the earth is round, and brings false doctrine into the village.”

Peer.  To tell the truth, we have always had pure faith here on the hill, and Monsieur Jeronimus isn’t far wrong in wishing to break off the match.

Montanus.  My good friends, tell Monsieur Jeronimus from me that he is committing a sin in attempting to force me to repudiate what I once have said—­a thing contrary to leges scholasticas and consuetudines laudabiles.

Peer.  Oh, Dominus!  Will you give up your pretty sweetheart for such trifles?  Every one will speak ill of it.

Montanus, The common man, vulgus, will speak ill of it; but my commilitiones, my comrades, will praise me to the skies for my constancy.

Peer.  Do you consider it a sin to say that the earth is flat or oblong?

Montanus.  No, I do not, but I consider it shameful and dishonorable for me, a Baccalaureus Philosophiae, to repudiate what I have publicly maintained, and to do anything that is improper for one of my order.  My duty is to see to it that ne quid detrimenti patiatur respublica philosophica.