'My Lord, place the consequences before your eye in every light. A rebellion in Paris is inevitable. The union of the French guard with the insurgents is also inevitable. What is the next step? The military will be ordered to fall on Paris, and drive the people and the guard before them, perhaps bombard the city, certainly cut down and trample under their horses' feet the innocent as well as the guilty. You know, my Lord, that this could not be done without the king's consent. Now, can you calculate _with certainty_ on his majesty giving orders for the massacre of his subjects? If you can, then well and good, the plan will succeed, at all events for a time. But if the king hesitate for only a few days,--if he refuse to permit the exercise of coercive measures on so terrible a scale, then the game is lost, you have roused the whole of France to madness, have forced the whole of the French people to take up arms, you will probably find that the French soldiers will side with them, and the whole of the old framework of the constitution will go down with a crash, and bring crown, coronet, and mitre under its ruins.' The bishop turned a little pale, and his hands trembled. 'You exaggerate the consequences,' he faltered out. 'Monseigneur, your own common sense, your clear perception of the state of public feeling at the time, must convince you that I do not exaggerate. You,--no, I will not say that,--the Court is resolved on using force to cut the Revolution short.' The bishop would not speak. 'Yes, my Lord, it is so. Remember, the success of your venture entirely depends on the king permitting the exercise of force. Can you calculate on that?' De Narbonne started up. His haughty manner had disappeared before the prospect opening upon him. He had been one of the most urgent in his advice to try the appeal to arms. He had never considered the chance of the king refusing to permit their being turned against the people. Knowing, as he well did, the kindness of the heart of Louis XVI; knowing that with all his feebleness of purpose, and readiness to yield to the opinion of the last speaker, he was conscientiously stubborn against violence; knowing that even that very day he had refused to allow the ex-minister to be arrested and sent to the Bastille, though this had been urged by the queen herself, the bishop saw now for the first time that the rock on which the Court scheme was in danger of being wrecked, was the goodness of the king's heart. The bishop looked at the curé and mused. Lindet said no more. After a protracted silence, De Narbonne said, in a low voice: 'It is too late; the die is cast.' He led the way into the other room. As Lindet bowed his farewell, the bishop held out his hand to him, and said, 'Thank you.' When the door closed upon the curé, he returned to the table at which Foulon and Berthier were seated, and said:--'The new ministry will have to be composed without me; I am resolved not to serve.' CHAPTER XXX.