"And was it my death you feared?" asked the Duke, gloomily looking up from his position, and bracing his nerves at this seeming summons to renewed action. "Were it to be found, I would seek it; but there is no death for me. Torn from this murderous world by violence, or sapped by the consuming hand of corporeal pain, neither can give me rest."
"Yes, my father," gently rejoined Louis, "there is rest in the grave when—"
"Silence!" interrupted the Duke, all his former haughtiness confirming his voice and manner: "Is it you that would cajole reason with sophistry? That would give up your unsullied truth at last, to insult your father by preaching an annihilation you know to be a falsehood? I know a different lesson. A man cannot rid himself of bodily pangs by moving from place to place. How then shall the torments of the spirit be extinguished, by so small a change as being in or out of this loathed prison of flesh? When my soul, my own and proper self, when it is freed by death from the fetters of the passions which have undone me; then I shall think even more intensely than I do now. I shall remember more than I do now. I shall see the naked springs, the undisguised consequences of all my actions. They will burn in my eyes for ever. For such, I feel, is the eternal book of accusation prepared for the immortal spirit that has transgressed beyond the hope of pardon, or the power of peace! Louis," added he, grasping his arm, and looking him sternly in the face; "has not your Pastor-Uncle taught you the same?"
"Yes; and more," replied his son. "He has taught me, that it is impossible for the finite faculties of man to comprehend the infinite attributes of God;—how he reconciles justice with mercy, in the mystery of the redemption, and renews the corrupted nature of man by the regeneration of repentance! Recall the promises of the Scriptures, my father; and there you will find, that He who washed David from blood-guiltiness, and blotted out the idolatry of Solomon; that He who pardoned Cephas for denying Him in the hour of trial, and satisfied the perverse infidelity of Thomas; that He who forgave Saul his persecutions, and made him the ablest apostle of his church; nay, that He who has been the propitiation of man, from the fall of Adam to the present hour,—wills not the death of a sinner, but calls him to repentance and to life!"
"But what," returned the Duke, "if I know nothing of these things? You start! But it is true. The Scriptures you talk of, is the only book I never opened." There was a terrible expression in the eyes of Ripperda as he delivered this, and listened to the heavy groan that burst from the heart of his son.
"In this hour," continued he, "when all human learning deserts me; rejected by the world, and loathing man and all his ways;—in this bitter hour, I believe, therein I might have found the word of life! But I derided its pretensions, and the penalty must be paid!"
Louis had recovered himself from the first shock of this awful confession. He beheld the desperate resignation of his father's countenance when uttering the last sentence; but he did not permit it to shake his manhood a second time, as he now took up the sacred subject in the language of Scripture itself. He had been well taught by the precepts and example of his Pastor-Uncle; and with a memory whose tenacity astonished even himself, and a power of argument which seemed the eloquence of inspiration, the young preacher sat by his father's side; till a light, like the morning sun, rose upon the chaos of his mind, and feeling warmth with the beam, his heart, which until now had been like a stone in his bosom, melted under the genial influence; and the eyes, which had not endured the softness of a tear for many months, overflowed on the hand of his son.
The soul of Louis was then as in heaven. He was speechless with gratitude; and when his father looked upon him, he beheld his face, indeed as an angel; for all that he had taught and promised, was then effulgent in his upward eyes.
Louis passed the night in his father's chamber. And before another sun arose and set, and rose again, he had so entirely satisfied him of the truth and efficacy of the religion of Christ, that the noble penitent begged to seal his repentance and his faith, by receiving the holy sacrament from the hands of the prior of Saint Philip's.
During these few sacred days, the Duke became so tranquillized by the hopes of religion, that he found freedom of mind sufficient, to converse with his son on his future temporal concerns. He took pen and ink, to write something to that effect; which he forbade Louis to open, till the writer were no more.