This at first excited great astonishment, but we soon remembered that the good Cazotte occasionally dreamed waking, and we all laughed heartily.
"M. Cazotte," said one of the guests, "the tale you relate to us here is not as merry as your 'Devil in Love' (a romance which Cazotte had written). What kind of a devil has given you the dungeon, the poison, and the hangman?—what has this in common with philosophy, and with the reign of Reason?"
"This is just what I told you," replied Cazotte. "In the name of philosophy, in the name of humanity, of liberty, of reason, it shall be that you shall take such an end; and then reason will still reign, for she will have temples; yes, at the same time there will be no temples in all France, but temples of Reason."
"Truly," said Chamfort, with a scornful smile, "you will not be one of the priests in these temples?"
"This I hope," replied Cazotte, "but you, M. de Chamfort, who will be one of them—and very worthy you are to be one—you will open your veins with twenty-two incisions of the razor—and yet you will only die a few months afterwards."
They look at each other, and continue to laugh. Cazotte continues:
"You, M. Vicq d'Azyr, you will not open your veins yourself; but afterwards you will get them opened six times in one day, and during the night you will die."
"You, M. Nicolli, you will die on the scaffold."
"You, M. Bailly, on the scaffold!"
"You, M. Malesherbes—you, on the scaffold!"