“I speak as a psychologist,” responded the savant who smiled in his turn at the exclamation of the judge; “that is just why, monsieur, our science is not susceptible of certain progress. Your exclamation proves that if I had needed any proof. Society cannot get beyond the theory of the good and the bad which for us has no other meaning than to mark a collection of conventions sometimes useful, sometimes puerile.” “You admit, however, that there are good actions and bad actions,” said M. Valette; then the magistrate asserting himself and turning this general discussion to the profit of his inquiry: “This poisoning of Mlle. de Jussat,” he insinuated, “for example, you will admit that this is a crime?” “From the social point of view, without doubt,” responded M. Sixte. “But for philosophy there is neither crime nor virtue. Our volitions are facts of a certain order governed by certain laws, that is all. But, monsieur,” and here the naïve vanity of the writer showed itself, “you will find a demonstration of these theories, which I venture to think conclusive, in my ‘Anatomy of the Will.’” “Did you sometimes approach these subjects with Robert Greslon?” asked the judge, “and do you believe that he shared your views?” “Very probably,” said the philosopher. “Do you know, monsieur,” asked the magistrate, unmasking his batteries, “that you come very near justifying the accusations of monsieur the Marquis de Jussat, who claims that the doctrines of contemporary materialists have destroyed all moral sense in this young man, and have made him capable of this murder?” “I do not know what matter is,” said M. Sixte, “so I am not a materialist. As to throwing upon a doctrine the responsibility of the absurd interpretation which a badly balanced brain gives to it, that is almost as bad as to reproach the chemist who discovered dynamite for the crimes in which this substance is employed. That is an argument which has no force.” The tone in which the philosopher pronounced these words revealed the invincible strength of spiritual resistance which profound faith gives, as a timidity almost infantile, in the midst of the stir of material life, was revealed in the accent with which he suddenly asked: “Do you believe that I shall be obliged to go to Riom to testify?” “I think not, monsieur,” said the judge who could not help noticing with new astonishment the contrast between the firmness of thought in the first part of his discourse and the anxiety with which this last sentence had been uttered, “for I see that your interviews with the prisoner have been more superficial than his mother believed, if indeed they were limited to those two visits and to a correspondence which appears to have been exclusively philosophical. But have you never received any confidences relating to his life with the Jussats?” “Never; beside he ceased to write to me almost immediately after he entered that family, said M. Sixte.”