out of the cafe I met the carriage of Monsieur B. [the
proselyting friend]. He stopped and invited me in for a drive, but
first asked me to wait for a few minutes whilst he attended to some
duty at the church of San Andrea delle Fratte. Instead of waiting in
the carriage, I entered the church myself to look at it. The church of
San Andrea was poor, small, and empty; I believe that I found myself
there almost alone. No work of art attracted my attention; and I
passed my eyes mechanically over its interior without being arrested by
any particular thought. I can only remember an entirely black dog
which went trotting and turning before me as I mused. In an instant
the dog had disappeared, the whole church had vanished, I no longer saw
anything, ... or more truly I saw, O my God, one thing alone.
"Heavens, how can I speak of it? Oh no! human words cannot attain to
expressing the inexpressible. Any description, however sublime it
might be, could be but a profanation of the unspeakable truth.

"I was there prostrate on the ground, bathed in my tears, with my heart
beside itself, when M. B. called me back to life. I could not reply to
the questions which followed from him one upon the other. But finally
I took the medal which I had on my breast, and with all the effusion of
my soul I kissed the image of the Virgin, radiant with grace, which it
bore. Oh, indeed, it was She! It was indeed She! [What he had seen had
been a vision of the Virgin.]

"I did not know where I was: I did not know whether I was Alphonse or
another. I only felt myself changed and believed myself another me; I
looked for myself in myself and did not find myself. In the bottom of
my soul I felt an explosion of the most ardent joy; I could not speak;
I had no wish to reveal what had happened. But I felt something solemn
and sacred within me which made me ask for a priest. I was led to one;
and there alone, after he had given me the positive order, I spoke as
best I could, kneeling, and with my heart still trembling. I could
give no account to myself of the truth of which I had acquired a
knowledge and a faith. All that I can say is that in an instant the
bandage had fallen from my eyes, and not one bandage only, but the
whole manifold of bandages in which I had been brought up. One after
another they rapidly disappeared, even as the mud and ice disappear
under the rays of the burning sun.

"I came out as from a sepulchre, from an abyss o