He put on his hat and wrapped himself in his mantle. Each freemason went out in his turn, alone and silent so as not to awaken suspicion. The last with the Supreme Master was the Surgeon Marat.
Very pale, he humbly approached him for he knew the terrible speaker’s power was unlimited.
“Master, did I commit a fault?” he inquired.
“A great one, and all the worse as you are not conscious that you did so,” replied the man of mystery.
“I confess it; not only ignorant, but I thought I spoke becomingly.”
“Pride—destructive demon! men hunt for fever in the veins and search for the cancer in the vitals, but they let pride shoot up such roots deeply in their heart as never to be able to wrench them out.”
“You have a very poor opinion of me, master,” returned Marat. “Am I so paltry a fellow that I am not to be counted among my equals? Have I culled the fruit of the tree of knowledge so clumsily that I am incapable of saying a word without being taxed with ignorance? Am I so lukewarm a member that my conviction is suspected? Were this all so, still I exist by reason of my devotion to the masses.”
“Brother, it is because the spirit of evil contends in you with that of good and seems to me to promise to overpower it one day, that I undertake to correct you. If I succeed it will be in one hour, unless pride has the upperhand of all your other passions.”
“Master, make an appointment which I will keep.”
“I will call on you.”