"Oh, if I only can rely upon your promises! The moment has arrived when I must believe. I tremble!"
"Oh, man of little faith!" answered the Franciscan with severity and pointing to the papal commissioner, who was preparing to speak; "listen—and repent that you doubted. Ask God to pardon you."
The silence became profound; the dealer in indulgences deftly rolled up the sleeves of his robe, just as a juggler in the market would have done in order not to be hindered in the tumultuous motions of his performance, and pointing to the red cross which he placed beside him, he cried in a stentorian voice fit to make the glass windows of the building rattle:
"In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, Amen![5] You see this cross, my beloved brothers? Well, this cross is as efficacious as the cross of Jesus Christ! You will ask me, How so? My answer is that this is, so to speak, the symbol of the indulgences that our Holy Father has commissioned me to dispense. But what are these indulgences? you will then ask? What they are, my brothers? They are the most precious gift, the most miraculous, the most wonderful that the Lord has ever bestowed upon His faithful! Therefore, I say unto you—Come, come to me; I shall give you letters furnished with the seal of our Holy Father, and thanks to these letters, my brothers—would you believe it?—not only will the sins that you have committed be pardoned, but they will give you absolution for the sins that you desire to commit!"
"Did you hear that?" Fra Girard whispered to Hervé. "One can obtain absolution both for the sins that he has committed, and for the sins that he intends to commit!"
"But—there—are—things—crimes and outrages," stammered Hervé with secret horror, "that, may be, one can not obtain absolution for! Oh, woe is me! I feel myself sliding down a fatal slope!
"Listen," replied the Franciscan, "listen to the end; you will then understand."
The mass of people that were crowded in the church received with indescribable signs of satisfaction the words uttered by the Dominican seller of indulgences; especially did those whose purses were well lined hail with delight the prospect of their salvation if they but took the precaution of equipping themselves in advance with an absolution that embraced the past, the present and the future. The Apostolic Commissioner observed the magic effect that his words produced; in a jovial and familiar tone he proceeded to harangue the audience amidst violent contortions of both face and limbs:
"Now, let us have a heart-to-heart talk, my brothers; let us reason together. Let us suppose that you wish to undertake a voyage into some strange country that is infested with thieves; fearing that you will be rifled of all that you carry about you before you attain the end of your journey, you do not wish to take your money with you. What do you do? You take your money to a banker, do you not? You allow him a slight profit, and he furnishes you with a draft, by means of which the money that you deposited with him is paid over to you in the strange country, upon your arrival there. Do you understand me well, my beloved brothers?"
"Yes," answered several of the faithful; "we understand—proceed with your discourse."