attain a
certain height are like the saints on the fronts of the churches: from
below we cause admiration for our beauty, but viewed closely we cause
horror from the ugliness of the stones corroded by time. However much
we wish to sanctify ourselves, keeping ourselves apart, we are still
nothing but men--creatures of flesh and blood like those who surround
us.

"In the Church those who free themselves from human passion are most
rare. And who knows if, even among those few privileged ones, some are
not driven by the demon of vanity to increase the asceticism of their
lives, thinking of the glory of being on an altar! The priest who
succeeds in subduing his flesh falls into avarice, which is the
ecclesiastical vice _par excellence_. I have never hoarded from vice;
I have saved for my own, but never for myself."

The prelate was silent for a long while; but in his irresistible
desire to confide in the simple old woman he went on.

"I am sure that God will not despise me when my hour comes. His
infinite mercy is above all the littleness of life. What has been my
fault? To have loved a woman, as my father loved my mother; to
have had children as the apostles and saints had. And why not?
Ecclesiastical celibacy is an invention of men, a detail of discipline
agreed upon at the councils; but the flesh and its exigencies are
anterior by many centuries; they date from Paradise. Whoever crosses
this barrier, not from vice, but from irresistible passion, because he
cannot conquer the impulse to create a family and to have a companion,
fails indubitably towards the laws of the Church, but he does not
disobey God. I fear the approach of death; many nights I doubt and
tremble like a child. But I have served God in my own way. In former
times I would have served Him with my sword, fighting against the
heretics. Now I am His priest and do battle for Him whenever I see the
impiety of the age curtailing anything of His glory. The Lord will
forgive me, receiving me into His bosom. You, who are so good, Tomasa,
and have the soul of an angel beneath your rough exterior, do you not
think so?"

The gardener's widow smiled, and her words fell slowly on the silence
of the dying evening.

"Tranquillise yourself, Don Sebastian. I have seen many saints in this
house, and they have been worth much less than you. To ensure their
salvation they would have abandoned their children. To maintain what
they call purity of soul they would have renou