May God grant it to me in such a case."
He looked up to heaven and made the sign of the cross.
At the sight of that sacred sign Julien felt an alleviation of the profound horror which had frozen him since his entry into the house.
"I have here three hundred and twenty-one aspirants for the most holy state," said the abbe Pirard at last, in a tone, which though severe, was not malicious; "only seven or eight have been recommended to me by such men as the abbe Chelan; so you will be the ninth of these among the three hundred and twenty-one.
But my protection means neither favour nor weakness, it means doubled care, and doubled severity against vice.
Go and lock that door."
Julian made an effort to walk, and managed not to fall.
He noticed that a little window near the entrance door looked out on to the country.
He saw the trees; that sight did him as much good as the sight of old friends.
"'Loquerisne linquam latinam?'" (Do you speak Latin?) said the abbe Pirard to him as he came back.
"'Ita, pater optime,'" (Yes, excellent Father) answered Julien, recovering himself a little.
But it was certain that nobody in the world had ever appeared to him less excellent than had M. Pirard for the last half hour.
The conversation continued in Latin.
The expression in the abbe's eyes softened. Julien regained some self-possession.
"How weak I am," he thought, "to let myself be imposed on by these appearances of virtue.
The man is probably nothing more than a rascal, like M. Maslon," and Julien congratulated himself on having hidden nearly all his money in his boots.
The abbe Pirard examined Julien in theology; he was surprised at the extent of his knowledge, but his astonishment increased when he questioned him in particular on sacred scriptures.
But when it came to questions of the doctrines of the Fathers, he perceived that Julien scarcely even knew the names of Saint Jerome, Saint Augustin, Saint Bonaventure, Saint Basile, etc., etc.
"As a matter of fact," thought the abbe Pirard, "this is simply that fatal tendency to Protestantism for which I have always reproached Chelan.
A profound, and only too profound knowledge of the Holy Scriptures." (Julien had just started speaking to him, without being questioned on the point, about the real time when Genesis, the Pentateuch, etc., has been written).
"To what does this never-ending reasoning over the Holy Scriptures lead to?" thought the abbe Pirard, "if not to self-examination, that is to say, the most awful Protestantism.
And by the side of this imprudent knowledge, nothing about the Fathers to compensate for that tendency."
But the astonishment of the director of the seminary was quite unbounded when having questioned Julien about the authority of the Pope, and expecting to hear the maxims of the ancient Gallican Church, the young man recited to him the whole book of M. de Maistre
"Strange man, that Chelan," thought the abbe Pirard.
"Did he show him the book simply to teach him to make fun of it?"
It was in vain that he questioned Julien and endeavoured to guess if he seriously believed in the doctrine of M. de Maistre.
The young man only answered what he had learnt by heart.
From this moment Julien was really happy. He felt that he was master of himself.
After a very long examination, it seemed to him that M. Pirard's severity towards him was only affected.
Indeed, the director of the seminary would have embraced Julien in the name of logic, for he found so much clearness, precision and lucidity in his answers, had it not been for the principles of austere gravity towards his theology pupils which he had inculcated in himself for the last fifteen years.
"Here we have a bold and healthy mind," he said to himself, "but corpus debile" (the body is weak).
"Do you often fall like that?" he said to Julien in French, pointing with his finger to the floor.
"It's the first time in my life. The porter's face unnerved me," added Julien, blushing like a child.
The abbe Pirard almost smiled.
"That's the result of vain worldly pomp.
You are apparently accustomed to smiling faces, those veritable theatres of falsehood.
Truth is austere, Monsieur, but is not our task down here also austere?
You must be careful that your conscience guards against that weakness of yours, too much sensibility to vain external graces."
"If you had not been recommended to me," said the abbe Pirard, resuming the Latin language with an obvious pleasure, "If you had not been recommended by a man, by the abbe Chelan, I would talk to you the vain language of that world, to which it would appear you are only too well accustomed.
I would tell you that the full stipend which you solicit is the most difficult thing in the world to obtain.
But the fifty-six years which the abbe Chelan has spent in apostolic work have stood him in poor stead if he cannot dispose of a stipend at the seminary."
After these words, the abbe Pirard recommended Julien not to enter any secret society or congregation without his consent.
"I give you my word of honour," said Julien, with all an honest man's expansion of heart.
The director of the seminary smiled for the first time.
"That expression is not used here," he said to him.
"It is too reminiscent of that vain honour of worldly people, which leads them to so many errors and often to so many crimes.
You owe me obedience by virtue of paragraph seventeen of the bull Unam Eccesiam of St. Pius the Fifth.
I am your ecclesiastical superior.
To hear in this house, my dear son, is to obey.
How much money, have you?"