"I am here to redeem my word, sire. I come to warn your majesty that you are proceeding too rashly with your measures of reform."
"And you also, Lacy!" cried Joseph, reproachfully. "You, the bravest of the brave, would have me retreat before the dissatisfaction of priests and bigots."
"The malcontents are not only priests and bigots, they are your whole people. You attempt too many reforms at once."
"But my reforms are all for the people's good. I am no tyrant to oppress and trample them under foot. I am doing my best to free them from the shackles of prejudice, and yet they harass and oppose me. Even those who understand my aims, place obstacles in my path. Oh, Lacy, it wounds me to see that not even my best friends sustain me!"
"I see that your majesty is displeased," replied Lacy, sadly, "and that you reckon me among your opponents—I who am struck with admiration at the grandeur of your conceptions. But you are so filled with the rectitude of your intentions, that you have no indulgence for the weakness and ignorance of those whom you would benefit, and you snake too light of the enmity of those whom your reforms have aggrieved."
"Whom have I aggrieved?" cried Joseph, impatiently. "Priests and nobles, nobody besides. If I have displeased them, it is because I wish to put all men on an equality. The privileged classes may hate me—let them do it, but the people whom I befriend will love and honor me."
"Ah, sire, you think too well of the people," said Lacy. "And mindful of my promise, I must say that you have given cause for dissatisfaction to all classes, plebeian as well as patrician."
"How so?" cried Joseph.
"You have despised their prejudices, and mocked at customs which in their superstitious ignorance they hold as sacred. They do not thank you for enlightening them. They call you an unbeliever and an apostate. Do not be displeased, sire, if I speak so plainly of things which the stupidity of your subjects regards as a crime. I come as your majesty's accuser, because I come as the advocate of your people, imploring you to be patient with their blindness and their folly."
"What now? Is there any special complaint against me?"