“Ah,” sighed Agnes, “that is true, my father,—woe is me! Please tell me how I could have helped it. I was pleased before I knew it.”
“And you have been thinking of what he said to you with pleasure since?” pursued the confessor, with an intense severity of manner, deepening as he spoke.
“I have thought of it,” faltered Agnes.
“Beware how you trifle with the holy sacrament! Answer frankly. You have thought of it with pleasure. Confess it.”
“I do not understand myself exactly,” said Agnes. “I have thought of it partly with pleasure and partly with pain.”
“Would you like to go with him and be his wife, as he said?”
“If it were right, father,—not otherwise.”
“Oh, foolish child! oh, blinded soul! to think of right in connection with an infidel and heretic! Do you not see that all this is an artifice of Satan? He can transform himself into an angel of light. Do you suppose this heretic would be brought back to the Church by a foolish girl? Do you suppose it is your prayers he wants? Why does, he not seek the prayers of the Church,—of holy men who have power with God? He would bait his hook with this pretence that he may catch your soul. Do you believe me?”
“I am bound to believe you, my father.”
“But you do not. Your heart is going after this wicked man.”