This is how he did it and what he said:
“There have been times when I myself have thought it would be a good thing to have a rest from the duties of a Catholic, m’sieu’ le cure,” he remarked to M. Savry, when the latter had ended his criticism. He said it with an air of conflict, and with full intent to make his supremacy complete.
“No Catholic should speak like that,” returned the shocked priest.
“No priest should speak to me as you have done,” rejoined Jean Jacques. “What do you know of the reasons for the abstention of madame? The soul must enjoy rest as well as the body, and madame has a—mind which can judge for itself. I have a body that is always going, and it gets too little rest, and that keeps my soul in a flutter too. It must be getting to mass and getting to confession, and saying aves and doing penance, it is such a busy little soul of mine; but we are not all alike, and madame’s body goes in a more stately way. I am like a comet, she is like the sun steady, steady, round and round, with plenty of sleep and the comfortable darkness. Sometimes madame goes hard; so does the sun in summer-shines, shines, shines like a furnace. Madame’s body goes like that—at the dairy, in the garden, with the loom, among the fowls, growing her strawberries, keeping the women at the beating of the flax; and then again it is all still and idle like the sun on a cloudy day; and it rests. So it is with the human soul—I am a philosopher—I think the soul goes hard the same as the body, churning, churning away in the heat of the sun; and then it gets quiet and goes to sleep in the cloudy day, when the body is sick of its bouncing, and it has a rest—the soul has a rest, which is good for it, m’sieu’. I have worked it all out so. Besides, the soul of madame is her own. I have not made any claim upon it, and I will not expect you to do more, m’sieu’ le cure.”
“It is my duty to speak,” protested the good priest. “Her soul is God’s, and I am God’s vicar—”
Jean Jacques waved a hand. “T’sh, you are not the Pope. You are not even an abbe. You were only a deacon a few years ago. You did not know how to hold a baby for the christening when you came to St. Saviour’s first. For the mass, you have some right to speak; it is your duty perhaps; but the confession, that is another thing; that is the will of every soul to do or not to do. What do you know of a woman’s soul-well, perhaps, you know what they have told you; but madame’s soul—”
“Madame has never been to confession to me,” interjected M. Savry indignantly. Jean Jacques chuckled. He had his New Cure now for sure.
“Confession is for those who have sinned. Is it that you say one must go to confession, and in order to go to confession it is needful to sin?”
M. Savry shivered with pious indignation. He had a sudden desire to rend this philosophic Catholic—to put him under the thumb-screw for the glory of the Lord, and to justify the Church; but the little Catholic miller-magnate gave freely to St. Saviour’s; he was popular; he had a position; he was good to the poor; and every Christmas-time he sent a half-dozen bags of flour to the presbytery!
All Pere Savry ventured to say in reply was: “Upon your head be it, M. Jean Jacques. I have done my duty. I shall hope to see madame at mass next Sunday.”