e and poverty! May
your Holiness give it the soul it lacks, a soul with the consciousness of
human dignity, of the necessary law of work, of free and fraternal life
regulated by justice only! Yes, may your Holiness make a people out of
that heap of wretches, whose excuse lies in all their bodily suffering
and mental night, who live like the beasts that go by and die, never
knowing nor understanding, yet ever lashed onward with the whip!"

Pierre's sobs were gradually choking him, and it was only the impulse of
his passion which still enabled him to speak. "And, Holy Father," he
continued, "is it not to you that I ought to address myself in the name
of all these wretched ones? Are you not the Father, and is it not before
the Father that the messenger of the poor and the lowly should kneel as I
am kneeling now? And is it not to the Father that he should bring the
huge burden of their sorrows and ask for pity and help and justice? Yes,
particularly for justice! And since you are the Father throw the doors
wide open so that all may enter, even the humblest of your children, the
faithful, the chance passers, even the rebellious ones and those who have
gone astray but who will perhaps enter and whom you will save from the
errors of abandonment! Be as the house of refuge on the dangerous road,
the loving greeter of the wayfarer, the lamp of hospitality which ever
burns, and is seen afar off and saves one in the storm! And since, O
Father, you are power be salvation also! You can do all; you have
centuries of domination behind you; you have nowadays risen to a moral
authority which has rendered you the arbiter of the world; you are there
before me like the very majesty of the sun which illumines and
fructifies! Oh! be the star of kindness and charity, be the redeemer;
take in hand once more the purpose of Jesus, which has been perverted by
being left in the hands of the rich and the powerful who have ended by
transforming the work of the Gospel into the most hateful of all
monuments of pride and tyranny! And since the work has been spoilt, take
it in hand, begin it afresh, place yourself on the side of the little
ones, the lowly ones, the poor ones, and bring them back to the peace,
the fraternity, and the justice of the original Christian communion. And
say, O Father, that I have understood you, that I have sincerely
expressed in this respect your most cherished ideas, the sole living
desire of your reign! The rest, oh! the res