That tyrant has begotten royalty, which is authority springing from the False, while science is authority springing from the True. Man should be governed by science.”

“And conscience,” added the bishop.

“The same thing: conscience is innate knowledge that we have.”

Monsieur Bienvenu listened with some amazement to this language, novel as it was to him.

The conventionist went on:

“As to Louis XVI: I said no. I do not believe that I have the right to kill a man, but I feel it a duty to exterminate evil. I voted for the downfall of the tyrant; that is to say, for the abolition of prostitution for woman, of slavery for man, of night for the child. In voting for the republic I voted for that: I voted for fraternity, for harmony, for light. I assisted in casting down prejudices and errors: their downfall brings light! We caused the old world to fall; the old world, a vase of misery, overturned, becomes an urn of joy to the human race.”

“Joy alloyed,” said the bishop.

“You might say joy troubled, and, at present, after this fatal return of the past which we call 1814, joy disappeared.k Alas! the work was imperfect I admit; we demolished the ancient order of things physically, but not entirely in the idea. To destroy abuses is not enough; habits must be changed. The windmill has gone, but the Wind is there yet.”

“You have demolished. To demolish may be useful, but I distrust a demolition effected in anger!”

“Justice has its anger, Monsieur Bishop, and the wrath of justice is an element of progress. Whatever may be said matters not, the French revolution is the greatest step forward taken by mankind since the advent of Christ; incomplete it may be, but it is sublime. It loosened all the secret bonds of society, it softened all hearts, it calmed, appeased, enlightened; it made the waves of civilisation flow over the earth; it was good. The French revolution is the consecration of humanity.”

The bishop could not help murmuring: “Yes, ‘93!”l

The conventionist raised himself in his chair with a solemnity well nigh mournful, and as nearly as a dying person could exclaim, he exclaimed:

“Ah! you are there! ‘93! I was expecting that. A cloud had been forming for fifteen hundred years; at the end of fifteen centuries it burst. You condemn the thunderbolt.”

Without perhaps acknowledging it to himself, the bishop felt that something in him had been struck; however, he made the best of it, and replied:

“The judge speaks in the name of justice, the priest in the name of pity, which is only a more exalted justice. A thunderbolt should not be mistaken.”

And he added, looking fixedly at the conventionist; “Louis XVII?”

The conventionist stretched out his hand and seized the bishop’s arm.

“Louis XVII. Let us see! For whom do you weep?—for the innocent child? It is well; I weep with you. For the royal child? I ask time to reflect. To my view the brother of Cartouche, an innocent child, hung by a rope under his arms in the Place de Grève till he died, for the sole crime of being the brother of Cartouche, is no less sad sight than the grandson of Louis XV; an innocent child, murdered in the tower of the Temple for the sole crime of being the grandson of Louis XV.”

“Monsieur,” said the bishop, “I dislike this coupling of names.”

“Cartouche or Louis XV; for which are you concerned?”

There was a moment of silence; the bishop regretted almost that he had come, and yet he felt strangely and inexplicably moved.

The conventionist resumed: “Oh, Monsieur Priest! you do not love the harshness of the truth, but Christ loved it. He took a scourge and purged the temple; his flashing whip was a harsh speaker of truths; when he said, ‘Sinite parvulos,’ he made no distinctions among the little ones.m He was not pained at coupling the dauphin of Barabbas with the dauphin of Herod. Monsieur, innocence is its own crown! Innocence has only to act to be noble! She is as august in rags as in the fleur de lys.”

“That is true,” said the bishop, in a low tone.

“I repeat,” continued the old man; “you have mentioned Louis XVII. Let us weep together for all the innocent, for all the martyrs, for all the children, for the low as well as for the high. I am one of them, but then, as I have told you, we must go further back than ‘93, and our tears must begin before Louis XVII. I will weep for the children of kings with you, if you will weep with me for the little ones of the people.”

“I weep for all,” said the bishop.

“Equally,” exclaimed G—, “and if the balance inclines, let it be on the side of the people; they have suffered longer.”

There was silence again, broken at last by the old man. He raised himself upon one elbow, took a pinch of his cheek between his thumb and his bent forefinger, as one does mechanically in questioning and forming an opinion, and addressed the bishop with a look full of all the energies of agony. It was almost an anathema.

“Yes, Monsieur, it is for a long time that the people have been suffering, and then, sir, that is not all; why do you come to question me and to speak to me of Louis XVII? I do not know you. Since I have been in this region I have lived within this plot alone, never passing beyond it, seeing none but this child who helps me. Your name, has, it is true, reached me faintly, and I must say with rather favorable reports, but that matters not. Adroit men have so many ways of imposing upon this good simple people. For instance I did not hear the sound of your carriage. You left it doubtless behind the thicket, down there at the branching of the road.