make him move an eyelash.
This was his character.

"You are mad. Marry my daughter, you! Marry her against my will!"

Dona Perfecta's trembling lips articulated these words in a truly tragic
tone.

"Against your will! She is of a different way of thinking."

"Against my will!" repeated Dona Perfecta. "Yes, and I repeat it again
and again. I do not wish it, I do not wish it!"

"She and I wish it."

"Fool! Is nothing else in the world to be considered but her and you?
Are there not parents; is there not society; is there not a conscience;
is there not a God?"

"Because there is society, because there is a conscience, because there
is a God," affirmed Rey gravely, rising to his feet, and pointing with
outstretched arm to the heavens, "I say and I repeat that I will marry
her."

"Wretch! arrogant man! And if you would dare to trample every thing
under your feet, do you think there are not laws to prevent your
violence?"

"Because there are laws, I say and I repeat that I will marry her."

"You respect nothing!"

"Nothing that is unworthy of respect."

"And my authority, my will, I--am I nothing?"

"For me your daughter is every thing--the rest is nothing."

Pepe Rey's composure was, so to say, the arrogant display of invincible
and conscious strength. The blows he gave were hard and crushing in
their force, without any thing to mitigate their severity. His words,
if the comparison may be allowed, were like a pitiless discharge of
artillery.

Dona Perfecta sank again on the sofa; but she shed no tears, and a
convulsive tremor agitated her frame.

"So that for this infamous atheist," she exclaimed, with frank rage,
"there are no social conventionalities, there is nothing but caprice.
This is base avarice. My daughter is rich!"

"If you think to wound me with that treacherous weapon, evading the
question and giving a distorted meaning to my sentiments in order to
offend my dignity, you are mistaken, dear aunt. Call me mercenary, if
you choose. God knows what I am."

"You have no dignity!"

"That is an opinion, like any other. The world may hold you to be
infallible. I do not. I am far from believing that from your judgments
there is no appeal to God."

"But is what you say true? But do you persist in your purpose, after my
refusal? You respect nothing, you are a monster, a bandit."

"I am a man."

"A wretch! Let us end this at once. I refuse to give my daughter to you;
I refuse her to you!"

"I