upon this, what have you to oppose against them?"
"Rather mention too," said Edmond, with bitterness," their prophets, their ecstasies, their absurd convulsive contortions, which the young learn from the old and deceive and grossly lie with the name of God on their lips."
"My son," said his father, sighing, while he gazed with emotion on the dark eyes of his son. "In all unrestrained passions man is transformed into an inexplicable but fearful miracle, then becomes realised and identified with him, what the wildest fancy itself cannot imagine more irrational. Let every man beware of this state, still less let him seek it, as you do, Edmond; your fire will consume you. Go not yonder so often to the lady of Castelnau: this will nourish your enthusiasm and destroy you."
Edmond quitted the hall abruptly without saying a word. The old man looked after him, sighed and said to himself, "Ardent love and bigotry encou-
