“Ha, father! do the lives of the Jansenists, then, depend on the contingency of their injuring your reputation? If so, I reckon them far from being in a safe position; for supposing it should be thought in the slightest degree _probable_ that they might do you some mischief, why, they are _killable_ at once! You have only to draw up a syllogism in due form, and, with a direction of the intention, you may despatch your man at once with a safe conscience. Thrice happy must those hot spirits be who cannot bear with injuries, to be instructed in this doctrine! But woe to the poor people who have offended them! Indeed, father, it would be better to have to do with persons who have no religion at all, than with those who have been taught on this system. For, after all, the intention of the wounder conveys no comfort to the wounded. The poor man sees nothing of that secret direction of which you speak; he is only sensible of the direction of the blow that is dealt him. And I am by no means sure but a person would feel much less sorry to see himself brutally killed by an infuriated villain, than to find himself conscientiously stilettoed by a devotee. To be plain with you, father, I am somewhat staggered at all this; and these questions of Father Lamy and Caramuel do not please me at all.” “How so?” cried the monk. “Are you a Jansenist?” “I have another reason for it,” I replied. “You must know I am in the habit of writing from time to time, to a friend of mine in the country, all that I can learn of the maxims of your doctors. Now, although I do no more than simply report and faithfully quote their own words, yet I am apprehensive lest my letter should fall into the hands of some stray genius, who may take into his head that I have done you injury, and may draw some mischievous conclusion from your premises.” “Away!” cried the monk; “no fear of danger from that quarter, I’ll give you my word for it. Know that what our fathers have themselves printed, with the approbation of our superiors, it cannot be wrong to read nor dangerous to publish.” I write you, therefore, on the faith of this worthy father’s word of honor. But, in the mean time, I must stop for want of paper—not of passages; for I have got as many more in reserve, and good ones too, as would require volumes to contain them.—I am, &c.[172] ----- Footnote 162: This Letter was revised by M. Nicole. Footnote 163: _In praxi_: liv. xxi., num. 62, p. 260. Footnote 164: De Just., liv. ii., c. 9, d. 12, n. 79. Footnote 165: In his book, De Spe, vol. ii., d. 15, sec. 4, 848. Footnote 166: De Sub. Pecc., diff. 9; Diana, p. 5; tr. 14, r. 99. Footnote 167: