M. LANTAIGNE: “There is much uncertainty in these explanations, monsieur. And rather than adopt them, I suspend my judgment, which inclines, I confess, towards the miraculous side, at least with respect to Saint Catherine’s sword. For the passage is precise: the sword was in the wall, and it was necessary to excavate to find it. Neither is it impossible, again, that God, upon the efficacious prayers of a virgin, should have given life back to a child that had died without having received baptism.”
M. BERGERET: “You speak, monsieur l’abbé, of ‘the efficacious prayers of a virgin.’ Do you then grant, in accordance with the belief of the Middle Ages, that there was some virtue, some peculiar power, in Jeanne d’Arc’s virginity?”
M. LANTAIGNE: “Clearly virginity is pleasing to God, and Jesus Christ rejoices in the triumph of His virgins. A young girl turned Attila and his Huns back from Lutetia; a young girl delivered Orleans and caused the lawful king to be crowned at Rheims.”
The priest having thus expressed himself, M. Bergeret seized on his words in a way of his own.
“Exactly,” said he. “Jeanne d’Arc was a mascotte.”
But Abbé Lantaigne did not hear. He rose and said:
“France’s destined rôle in Christendom is not yet achieved. I foresee that ere long God will yet again work His will through the nation which has been the most faithful and the most faithless to Him.”
“And so it is,” answered M. Bergeret, “that, as in the profligate times of King Charles VII., we behold the rise of prophetesses. Our town indeed holds one of them, who is making a happier start than Jeanne, since Jacquot d’Arc’s daughter was regarded as mad by her parents, and Mademoiselle Deniseau finds a disciple in her own father. Still I do not believe that her good luck will be great and lasting. Our préfet, M. Worms-Clavelin, is somewhat wanting in good breeding, but he is less of a simpleton than Baudricourt, and it is no longer the custom for the heads of the State to give audience to prophetesses. M. Félix Faure will not be advised by his confessor to test Mademoiselle Deniseau. Here, perhaps, you may reply, monsieur l’abbé, that the influence of Bernadette of Lourdes is stronger in our days than that of Jeanne d’Arc ever was. The latter overthrew some hundreds of starving and panic-stricken English; Bernadette has set countless pilgrims on the march and drawn thousands of millions to a mountain in the Pyrenees. And my revered friend, M. Pierre Laffitte, assures me that we have entered on an era of positive philosophy.”
“As for what happens at Lourdes,” said Abbé Lantaigne, “without becoming latitudinarian or falling into excessive credulity, I reserve my opinion on a point upon which the Church has made no pronouncement. But henceforth I see a triumph for religion in this crowd of pilgrims, just as you yourself see in it a defeat for materialistic philosophy.”