He did not finish the sentence; but what he added to himself, spitefully enough, was to the effect that, ‘whether or not,’ he had paid out his cousin for all her contumelious and persistent snubbing.
CHAPTER XXI.—THE CONFESSION.
‘Dieu, qui, dès le commencemeut de la création, avez en tirant la femme d’une côte de l’homme établi le grand sacrement du mariage, vous qui l’avez honorée et relevée si hautsoit en vous, incarnant dans le sein d’une femme, soit en commençant vos miracles par celui des noces de Cana, vous qui avez jadis accordé ce remède, suivant vos vues, à mon incontinente faiblesse, ne repoussez pas les prières de votre servante: je les verse humblement aux pieds de votre divine majesté pour mes péchés et pour ceux de mon bien-aimé. O Dieu qui êtes la bonté même, pardonnez à nos crimes si grands, et que l’immensité de votre miséricorde se mesure à la multitude de nos fautes. Prenez contre vos serviteurs la verge de la correction, non le glaive de la fureur. Frappez la chair pour conserver les âmes. Venez en pacificateur, non en vengeur; avec bonté plûtot qu’avec justice; en père miséricordieux, non en maître sévère.‘
The Prater of Héloïse (written for her by Abelard).
Alma remained as her uncle and cousin had left her, leaning against the mantelpiece, with her eyes fixed, her frame convulsively trembling. Yet her look and manner still would have confirmed Sir George in his opinion that she bore the shock ‘better than might have been expected.’ She did not cry or moan. Once or twice her hand was pressed upon her heart, as if to still its beating, that was all.
Nevertheless, she was already aware that the supreme sorrow, the fatal dishallucination, of her life had come. She saw all her cherished hopes and dreams, her fairy castles of hope and love, falling to pieces like houses of cards; the idol of her life falling with them, changing to clay and dust; the whole world darkening, all beauty withering, in a chilly wind from the eternity of shadows. If Ambrose Bradley was base, if the one true man she had ever known and loved was false, what remained? Nothing but disgrace and death.
He had been in her eyes next to God, without speck or flaw, perfectly noble and supreme; one by one he had absorbed all her childish faiths, while in idolatry of passion she had knelt at his feet adoring him—
He for God only, she for God in him.