imes, as is the case with the saints really has the substance of
virtue. In us it is nearly always pure malevolence, because we do not
know how to love. The prayer I love best, after the _Pater Noster_, is
the prayer of Unity, which unites us all in the spirit of Christ, when
He prays thus to the Father: '_Ut et ipsi in nobis unum sint._' The
desire and hope are always strong within us of a union in God with those
of our brothers whose beliefs separate them from us. Therefore say now
whether you accept my proposal to found this association. First discuss
the question, and then, if the proposal be accepted we will examine the
means of promoting it."

Don Paolo exclaimed impetuously, that the principle needed no
discussion; and Minucci observed, in a submissive tone, that the object
of the meeting was known to all before they came; therefore, by their
presence, they had implied their approval and their willingness to bind
themselves together in a common action; the question of ways and means
remaning still undecided. Abbe Marinier asked permission to speak. "I
am really very sorry," he said smiling, "but I have not brought even the
smallest thread with which to bind myself. I also am one of those who
see many things going wrong in the Church. Still, when Signor Selva
carefully explained his views to me (first at supper and then here),
views which I had not clearly understood from my friend Professor
Dane's explanation, certain objections, which I consider serious, forced
themselves upon me."

"Exactly," thought Minucci, who had heard how ambitious Marinier was;
"if you look for promotion, you must not join us;" and he added aloud:
"Let us hear them."

"In the first place, gentlemen," the clever Abbe said, "it seems to me
you have begun with the second meeting. I may say, with all due respect,
that you remind me of a party of good people who sit down to a game of
cards, and cannot get on because one holds Italian, one French, another
German cards, and therefore they cannot understand one another. I have
heard unanimity of opinions mentioned; but there exists perhaps among
us rather a unanimity of negative opinions. We are probably unanimous in
believing that the Catholic Church has grown to resemble a very ancient
temple, originally of great simplicity, of great spirituality, which
the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries have crowded with
superfluities. Perhaps the more malicious among you will say that only