turned my head and I saw a
number of the dead in living bodies.
These are the worst spectres, because
they must be subdued: you touch them,
they touch you, and, in order to drag
you away to their tomb, they seize
you with an arm of flesh which is no
better than the marble hand of the
Commendatore."

EUGENE PELLETAN (ELISEE, _Voyage d'un homme
a la recherche de lui-meme_).

Marcel went away disconsolate. So it was done. He was changed, another put
in his place at Althausen. He had hoped for opposition, he had counted on
objections from the Bishop, he thought, in short, that he would remain in
suspense for some weeks, perhaps for some months, during which he would
have the time to look before him and reflect; but no, all at once: "Go and
tell the Abbe Ridoux that you have the cure." Well, and Suzanne? Could he
leave Suzanne in this way? He had, it is true, informed her of his
departure the day before; but had not everything changed since the day
before? Could be abandon thus his heart which he had left behind there?
More than his heart, his whole soul, his life, the maiden who had yielded
herself.

Strange contradictions. When he had believed his change far distant and
still but slightly probable, he had thought he could leave Suzanne easily,
arrange far away from her for secret interviews, and await events; now that
this change was certain and had just become an accomplished fact, he looked
upon it as a catastrophe. Instead of hastening to announce _the good news_
to Ridoux, he proceeded to roam through the streets, assailed by his
thoughts.

"And I shall be obliged to live in this world which I have just caught a
glimpse of, to elbow these men at every hour, to mingle in their intrigues,
to blend myself in their life. That unscrupulous old Comtesse, that
insolent prelate, Gaudinet, Matou, Simonet and the rest, all oozing forth
hypocrisy, intrigue and vice; dreaming of one thing alone, to satisfy their
ambition, their passions, and their appetites. And these are the ministers
of God! Veronica was quite right:

"'All the same, we are all the same, all.' And I am one of the least bad. I
was blind and idiotic not to have cast my gaze earlier into this filthy
sewer.--Blind, idiotic and deaf."

He passed near a lofty, gloomy building. It was the Seminary. The desire
came upon him to go in. Some of his old fellow-pupils had remained there,
as masters or professors. But he altered his mind. What wa