“I cannot see why they should touch me,” he said. “I have done nothing to provoke them. They insult us, they tell lies, and I do not resent it. Do you know the stories that have been brought to me this week? I find them amusing.” He laughed pleasantly. “See how they represent the church! A Catholic man, they say, wanted to steal a hundred dollars. Now, to take so much at once would be a mortal sin; but to steal ten cents would be only a venial sin. So my brave Catholic steals ten cents, and, after a week, ten cents more, and so on, till he has the hundred dollars. By this means, he secures his money, and is guilty only of a thousand venial sins, which he gets forgiveness for by giving the priest fifty dollars. That is one of Mr. John Conway’s stories. Here is another that was published in the _Herald_, with my name and the others in full. You know that Mrs. Mary O’Conner’s husband lately died in California. Well, the _Herald_ says that the poor widow came to me, weeping and lamenting that she had not even the consolation of seeing her husband’s grave; and I told her that, for thirty dollars, I would have him buried here. She had saved thirty dollars, earned by washing, and she brought it to me. Three days after, I told her that her husband’s body had been miraculously brought, and I pointed out the spot where it was buried, down here 165 behind the church. But I warned her that she must not dig there, as it would be a sacrilege, and that, if she did, the body would disappear. Here’s another: Patrick Mulligan confesses some sin to me, and, for a penance, I tell him to give himself twenty-five blows with the discipline. Patrick goes home, gets ready for his penance, and suddenly remembers that he has no discipline. It is late at night. He puts his head out the window, and sees that Mrs. Mahony, next door, has forgotten to take in her clothes-line, and a fine new clothes-line it is. Pat blesses the saints, creeps down-stairs, steals the clothes-line, and, going back, cuts it up into a beautiful discipline. After he has piously beaten himself, he burns the cord all up, that he may not be known as a thief, goes to bed with a clear conscience, and sleeps the sleep of the just. “Now, sir,” the priest concluded, “it is not likely that I am to be attacked for such stories as that. Of course, no sensible person believes them; or, if people should doubt, they can easily find out the truth.”