“Louis Lambert!” “Has fallen a victim to catalepsy. There is no hope for him,” said Bianchon. “He will die, his soul wandering in the skies, his body unconscious on earth,” said Michel Chrestien solemnly. “He will die as he lived,” said d’Arthez. “Love fell like a firebrand in the vast empire of his brain and burned him away,” said Léon Giraud. “Yes,” said Joseph Bridau, “he has reached a height that we cannot so much as see.” “_We_ are to be pitied, not Louis,” said Fulgence Ridal. “Perhaps he will recover,” exclaimed Lucien. “From what Meyraux has been telling us, recovery seems impossible,” answered Bianchon. “Medicine has no power over the change that is working in his brain.” “Yet there are physical means,” said d’Arthez. “Yes,” said Bianchon; “we might produce imbecility instead of catalepsy.” “Is there no way of offering another head to the spirit of evil? I would give mine to save him!” cried Michel Chrestien. “And what would become of European federation?” asked d’Arthez. “Ah! true,” replied Michel Chrestien. “Our duty to Humanity comes first; to one man afterwards.” “I came here with a heart full of gratitude to you all,” said Lucien. “You have changed my alloy into golden coin.” “Gratitude! For what do you take us?” asked Bianchon. “We had the pleasure,” added Fulgence. “Well, so you are a journalist, are you?” asked Léon Giraud. “The fame of your first appearance has reached even the Latin Quarter.” “I am not a journalist yet,” returned Lucien. “Aha! So much the better,” said Michel Chrestien. “I told you so!” said d’Arthez. “Lucien knows the value of a clean conscience. When you can say to yourself as you lay your head on the pillow at night, ‘I have not sat in judgment on another man’s work; I have given pain to no one; I have not used the edge of my wit to deal a stab to some harmless soul; I have sacrificed no one’s success to a jest; I have not even troubled the happiness of imbecility; I have not added to the burdens of genius; I have scorned the easy triumphs of epigram; in short, I have not acted against my convictions,’ is not this a viaticum that gives one daily strength?” “But one can say all this, surely, and yet work on a newspaper,” said Lucien. “If I had absolutely no other way of earning a living, I should certainly come to this.” “Oh! oh! oh!” cried Fulgence, his voice rising a note each time; “we are capitulating, are we?” “He will turn journalist,” Léon Giraud said gravely. “Oh, Lucien, if you would only stay and work with us! We are about to bring out a periodical in which justice and truth shall never be violated; we will spread doctrines that, perhaps, will be of real service to mankind——” “You will not have a single subscriber,” Lucien broke in with Machiavellian wisdom. “There will be five hundred of them,” asserted Michel Chrestien, “but they will be worth five hundred thousand.” “You will néed a lot of capital,” continued Lucien. “No, only devotion,” said d’Arthez.