"Oh, sire, you show me in this the greatest earthly kindness; you make me completely irresponsible. Woe to the fools and lunatics who are mad enough to lend me money! From this time onward, I shall never know a weary or listless moment. I shall have always the cheering and inspiring occupation of winning the hearts of trusting and weak-minded dunces, and, by adroit sleight-of-hand, transferring the gold from their pockets to my own."
"You are incorrigible," said the king. "I doubt if all mankind are made after the image of God. I think many of the race resemble the devil, and I look upon you, Pollnitz, as a tolerably successful portrait of his satanic majesty. I don't suppose you will be much discomposed by this opinion. I imagine you look upon God and the devil in very much the same light."
"Oh, not so, your majesty; I am far too religious to fall into such errors."
"Yes, you are too religious; or, rather you have to many religions.
To which, for example, do you now profess to belong?"
"Sire, I have become a Protestant."
"From conviction?"
"So long as I believed in the possibility of marrying several millions—yes, from conviction. These millions would have made me happy, and surely I might allow myself to become a Protestant in order to be happy."
"Once for all, how many times have you changed your religion?" said the king, thoughtfully.
"Oh, not very often, sire! I am forever zealously seeking after the true faith, and so long as I do not find that religion which makes me content with such things as I have, I am forced to change in justice to myself. In my childhood I was baptized and brought up a Lutheran, and I had nothing against it, and remained in that communion till I went to Rome; there I saw the Holy Father, the Pope, perform mass, and the solemn ceremony roused my devotional feelings to such a height that I became a Catholic immediately. This was, however, no change of religion. Up to this time I had not acted for myself; so the Catholic may be justly called my first faith."
"Yes, yes! that was about the time you stole your dying bride's diamonds and fled from France."