"With Your Eminence's permission I will accompany the boy back to Rome," the secretary said one day, shortly before Josè's return to the seminary. "I will consult with the Rector, and suggest that certain and special tutelage be given the lad. Let them bring their powers of reasoning and argument to bear upon him, to the end that his thinking may be directed into proper channels before it is too late. _Hombre!_" he muttered, as with head bent and hands clasped behind his back he slowly paced before the Archbishop. "To think that he is a Rincón! And yet, but sixteen--a babe--a mere babe!" CHAPTER 7 It must have been, necessarily, a very complex set of causes that could lay hold on a boy so really gifted as Josè de Rincón and, against his instincts and, on the part of those responsible for the deed, with the certain knowledge of his disinclination, urge him into the priesthood of a religious institution with which congenitally he had but little in common. To begin with, the bigoted and selfish desires of his parents found in the boy's filial devotion a ready and sufficient means of compelling him to any sacrifice of self. Only a thorough understanding of the Spanish temperament will enable one to arrive at a just estimate of Josè's character, and the sacredness of the promises given his mother. Though the child might pine and droop like a cankered rosebud, yet he would never cease to regard the sanctity of his oath as eternally binding. And the mother would accept the sacrifice, for her love for her little son was clouded by her great ambitions in respect to his earthly career, and her genuine solicitude for his soul's eternal welfare. Family tradition, sacred and inviolable, played its by no means small part in this affair. Custom, now as inviolable as the Jewish law, decreed that the first-born son should sink his individuality into that of the Mother Church. And to the Spaniard, _costumbre_ is law. Again, the vacillating and hesitant nature of the boy himself contributed largely to the result; for, though supremely gifted in receptivity and broadness of mind, in critical analysis and keenness of perception, he nevertheless lacked the energy of will necessary to the shaping of a life-course along normal lines. The boy knew what he preferred, yet he said _Amen_ both to the prayers of his parents and the suggestions of doubt which his own mind offered. He was weakest where the greatest firmness was demanded. His love of study, his innate shrinking from responsibility, and his repugnance toward discord and strife--in a word, his lack of fighting qualities--naturally caused him to seek the lines of least resistance, and thus afforded a ready advantage to those who sought to influence him.