ly. Truth and nature, no doubt, had
already regained too much ascendancy over him for those feelings to
return. The thought of such a lying apostolate now wounded him; he no
longer had the hypocritical courage to call the Divinity down upon the
believers kneeling before him, when he was convinced that the Divinity
would not descend. Thus all the past was swept away; there remained
nothing of the sublime pastoral part he would once have liked to play,
that supreme gift of himself which lay in stubborn adherence to the rules
of the Church, and such devotion to faith as to endure in silence the
torture of having lost it.

What must Marie think of his prolonged falsehood, he wondered, and
thereupon he seemed to hear her words again: "Why not take your cassock
off?" His conscience bled as if those words were a stab. What contempt
must she not feel for him, she who was so upright, so high-minded? Every
scattered blame, every covert criticism directed against his conduct,
seemed to find embodiment in her. It now sufficed that she should condemn
him, and he at once felt guilty. At the same time she had never voiced
her disapproval to him, in all probability because she did not think she
had any right to intervene in a struggle of conscience. The superb
calmness and healthiness which she displayed still astonished him. He
himself was ever haunted and tortured by thoughts of the unknown, of what
the morrow of death might have in store for one; but although he had
studied and watched her for days together, he had never seen her give a
sign of doubt or distress. This exemption from such sufferings as his own
was due, said she, to the fact that she gave all her gaiety, all her
energy, all her sense of duty, to the task of living, in such wise that
life itself proved a sufficiency, and no time was left for mere fancies
to terrify and stultify her. Well, then, since she with her air of quiet
strength had asked him why he did not take off his cassock, he would take
it off--yes, he would divest himself of that robe which seemed to burn
and weigh him down.

He fancied himself calmed by this decision, and towards morning threw
himself upon his bed; but all at once a stifling sensation, a renewal of
his abominable anguish, brought him to his feet again. No, no, he could
not divest himself of that gown which clung so tightly to his flesh. His
skin would come away with his cloth, his whole being would be lacerated!
Is not the mark of priest