CONFESSOR. Is he ready now?
LADY. Nothing remains for this unhappy man but to leave the world and bury himself in a monastery.
CONFESSOR. So he doesn't believe he's the great inventor he undoubtedly is?
LADY. No. He can believe good of no one, not even of himself.
CONFESSOR. That is the punishment Heaven sent him: to believe lies, because he wouldn't listen to the truth.
LADY. Lighten his guilty burden for him, if you can.
CONFESSOR. No. If I did he'd only grow insolent and accuse God of malice and injustice. This man is a demon, who must be kept confined. He belongs to the dangerous race of rebels; he'd misuse his gifts, if he could, to do evil. And men's power for evil is immeasurable.
LADY. For the sake of the... attachment you've shown me, can't you ease his burden a little; where it presses on him most and where he's least to blame?
CONFESSOR. You must do that, not I; so that he can leave you in the belief that you've a good side, and that you're not what your first husband told him you were. If he believes you, I'll deliver him later, just as I once bound him when he confessed to me, during his illness, in the convent of St. Saviour's.
LADY (going to the back and opening the door). As you wish!