vers a heart that feels kindly and truly for you. I have heard of
your sufferings and have come to bring you succor. I have not forgotten
the kind attention and care I received in your house when, six years
ago, I came here from Breslau as a mendicant lay brother, and fell
fainting before your door. There were indeed hard-hearted Lutherans who
chid you for your charity and said you ought not to trouble yourself
about the beggarly papist priest,--but you answered that it was your
christian duty to succor a fellow christian. That was a noble
sentiment, and has ever since remained engraved upon my heart, and I
have daily offered up my prayers that God would bless you for it
through time and eternity. It is true that by some of my brethren this
prayer for a heretic has been considered sinful; but I have answered
them, '_Solum de salute Diaboli desperandum_,' and that it may please
the Lord in his mercy to bring this good woman one day, if even upon
her death bed, into the embrace of the only saving church.'

'May God reward your love, my good father,' said Katharine with a
feeble utterance. 'A kindly human heart is always deserving of respect
and esteem, even though it wander in error.'

'I came not,' answered the monk, 'to hold a controversial discussion
with you. My only wish is to warn you of what must necessarily and
absolutely be done, if you would save your mortal body, to say nothing
of your immortal soul. You must know that it is the irrevocable
determination of the emperor that all the protestants in his hereditary
dominions shall return to the true faith, and for that sole purpose has
he sent his troops to this city. It is true that these soldiers conduct
themselves here in a manner which no true catholic can justify, and
should one of these so called _converters_ stray into my confessional,
he would have a hard time of it. But so it is, and I, a poor feeble
monk, have no power to avert the evil. The Jesuits, who hold the
emperor's heart in their hands, might and should have prevented it; but
they have kindled the fire and poured oil thereon. Wherefore I say,
yield to the times, for they are dangerous. Without a certificate of
confession your tormentor will not leave you--he dares not, even if he
would. I bring you the necessary certificate. The urgency of the moment
will not permit a formal confession, and you therefore need only
subscribe to these articles. You can send your certificate to count
Dohna, and rece