Again, you would have Lessius to say “that he condemns the practice of it;” and, as I have just observed, there is not in the original a single word of condemnation; all that he says is: “It appears that it ought not to be EASILY permitted in practice—_In praxi non videtur FACILE permittenda_.” Is that, fathers, the language of a man who _condemns_ a maxim? Would you say that adultery and incest ought not to be _easily permitted_ in practice? Must we not, on the contrary, conclude, that as Lessius says no more than that the practice ought not to be easily permitted, his opinion is, that it may be permitted sometimes, though rarely? And, as if he had been anxious to apprize everybody when it might be permitted, and to relieve those who have received affronts from being troubled with unreasonable scruples, from not knowing on what occasions they might lawfully kill in practice, he has been at pains to inform them what they ought to avoid in order to practise the doctrine with a safe conscience. Mark his words: “It seems,” says he, “that it ought not to be easily permitted, _because_ of the danger that persons may act in this matter out of hatred or revenge, or with excess, or that this may occasion too many murders.” From this it appears that murder is freely permitted by Lessius, if one avoids the inconveniences referred to—in other words, if one can act without hatred or revenge, and in circumstances that may not open the door to a great many murders. To illustrate the matter, I may give you an example of recent occurrence—the case of the buffet of Compiègne.[249] You will grant that the person who received the blow on that occasion has shown by the way in which he has acted, that he was sufficiently master of the passions of hatred and revenge. It only remained for him, therefore, to see that he did not give occasion to too many murders; and you need hardly be told, fathers, it is such a rare spectacle to find Jesuits bestowing buffets on the officers of the royal household, that he had no great reason to fear that a murder committed on this occasion would be likely to draw many others in its train. You cannot, accordingly, deny that the Jesuit who figured on that occasion was _killable_ with a safe conscience, and that the offended party might have converted him into a practical illustration of the doctrine of Lessius. And very likely, fathers, this might have been the result had he been educated in your school, and learnt from Escobar that the man who has received a buffet is held to be disgraced until he has taken the life of him who insulted him. But there is ground to believe, that the very different instructions which he received from a curate, who is no great favorite of yours, have contributed not a little in this case to save the life of a Jesuit.