should continue in his vices, as not to see that it is

your duty to withdraw him from them, and that you lie to your conscience, to your charge, to your God. But pardon, pardon me. God is my witness that it is from no bitterness, no personal animosity—"

La Chaise no longer heard him. At the first words, the poor Jesuit had risen, and in spite of all Bourdaloue's efforts, had not ceased his progress towards the door,-menacing Claude at some moments, and at others overwhelmed. When he had reached the door, Claude also wished to stop him, but in vain. In a few seconds he had reached the foot of the stairs.

"It is useless," said the minister, sadly; "he is gone. Be sure to tell him, I beg of you, that I did not expect so sudden a departure, and that I should have been glad to shake hands with him. He would have seen that the purest zeal was the only source of my reproaches, and that charity had not for an instant quitted my heart. But where were we? There is no time to

be lost. Have you the courage to go on ?”

"I must have it. Good God! what an evening! What a scene !"

"Did I do wrong in showing myself?"

"Oh! no. When you interrupted him, it seemed to me as if he were Satan himself, there was so much art and so much se duction in his words. And yet he is not bad; he is weak—”

"Well! and do you not know, that in this world the weak do more harm than the wicked?"

"I have said it often in the pulpit, but I have never understood t as well as to-day. Go on, I am ready."

Claude recommenced his walk, and sometimes quickly, somemes a little less rapidly, according as words came more or less abundantly, he dictated to him about four pages.

"I shall never dare to say that!" cried Bourdaloue, at a certain passage.

Claude continued without heeding.

"I shall never dare to say that!" he repeated, throwing down his pen after having written the last words.

"Yes, you will dare," said Claude. And he went away.

CHAPTER XVII.

BOURDALOUE REMAINS ALONE.-COMMITS TO MEMORY AND RECITES HIS PERORATION.-BOSSUET HEARS AND APPROVES OF IT.

BOURDALOUE, however, remained seated. In committing hastily to paper the rapid improvisation of Claude, he had scarcely been able to take it in as a whole; he had not even endeavored to do this. Agitated, uneasy, his mind had only followed his pen. Claude had been gone a quarter of an hour, before he had even glanced at the pages lying before him.

At length, he appeared to perceive them; his eye rested upon them, at first casually, then with more and more attention. He read, he re-read his new peroration, and at every sentence, (for he was accustomed to read aloud,) his voice became stronger, his accent more spirited. Look at the musician whose eye falls by chance on a beautiful composition which is new to him. He runs through it at first carelessly; he does not sing,—he scarcely hums it. Gradually he becomes aroused; one measure pleases him, then a second, then another.-His enthusiasm is awakened, and to the real beauty of the composition is added the brilliancy of an improvisation.-The applause is unanimous.

No one applauded the orator, for he was alone; but he himself applauded; he was more and more astonished, more and more struck.

We have not this passage. It was not found among Bourdalɔue's papers, and the sermon has come down to posterity with

the pages which the author tore out.-Why for the sake of his honor were they not lost!

"That is it,” he at length exclaimed; "that is it! I shall leave out nothing, I shall add nothing.-They may say what they will.-What a pity that the author should be a-— But who will know that, after all? And if it is well received, if it touches the king's conscience"

He stopped, and became thoughtful.

"If it touches the king's conscience," he said to himself, “it will do me much credit;-much credit for a courage,—which I shall not have had of my own accord ;-much credit for an eloquence which is not my own. And what is to be done, however? -Bah! God will provide.—I will go on, at all events."

And, leaving the paper, he began to repeat the first lines by heart, then the following, then more still.-In short, he had finished when he scarcely thought he had learned half. He could not recover from his surprise; he had never found his memory so prompt; he had never before so well understood the Abbé de Fénélon's favorite maxim, that a passage really written with enthusiasm is always quickly learned, even when one is not its author.

As he finished, the door opened, and a man hastened in an agitated manner toward him, with his arms extended.-It was Bossuet.

He had returned from the chateau.-In hearing from the staircase the sound of the preacher's voice, he had not been able to restrain as before at the sight of the shadow, a slight smile of pity. But as he ascended, the voice became more impressive; the words, which he began to distinguish, seemed, like the tone, to have something new and penetrating; it was Bourdaloue, and it was not he. Motionless behind the door, his head bent forward, and his hand on the latch, he listened. His astonishment, his admiration continued to increase; and as the periods were

too rounded and flowing for him to believe them extemporized, he could not conceive how, in less than two hours, the orator had written so much, and memorized it so well. But what astonished him the most, was, to find the man whom he had left so depressed, suddenly raised to such a height,—for he was a long way from supposing that any one had aided in this; he had even forgotten that Claude remained with Bourdaloue after the departure of the Fénélons and himself.

One of the greatest pleasures which we can have, either through the mind or the heart, is to hear expressed with precision and power our own ideas; and sentiments which are dear to us, but which we have never yet expressed ourselves, because we should have trembled for fear of expressing them tamely, or badly,—and for this reason, the greatest triumphs of eloquence have always been owing, much less to any novelty of ideas, than to the ability, or rather the enthusiasm with which the orator seized upon those which he knew to be already existing in the minds of his audience.* Never, perhaps, had this enjoyment been more vividly experienced by Bossuet than in this moment. In indicating to Bourdaloue the principal ideas to be added to his discourse, he had not concealed from himself, what a difficult task it must be. A man of experience is rarely at a loss to know what to say; but the how to say it puzzles the most skilful. We do not doubt but that Bossuet would have succeeded very well; but it was no less an agreeable surprise for him to find that which he had left in the germ, fully developed, and developed with a copiousness and vigor which he scarcely flattered himself that he would have been able to attain.

"And I who came back to help you!" he cried. 66 And you who had asked me to do so!-Truly, wher one writes so slowly and so ill, one absolutely requires aid!"

* "Tantum de medis sumptis accedit honoris, HORACE Art. Poet