Section 7, Part 2 Summary

As Robespierre leaves, David and Philidor strike up a conversation. When Philidor hears that Mireille and Valentine have come from Montglane, he tells David he knows all about the Montglane Service, having heard about it from Euler (the same mathematician who warned Catherine the Great about the Freemasons - Section 5) whom Philidor met in the company of the composer Johann Sebastian Bach. Philidor then relates in some detail the story of that encounter, in which the musician Bach and the mathematician Euler surprised each other with displays of the direct, symbiotic relationship between mathematics and music - both of which, according to Bach, are manifestations of the language of God, whom he calls the Architect (see "Quotes," p. 165-166). Bach maintains that the Service holds the key to both understanding that language and making use of its power.

As Philidor and...