"You know that there is no more convinced sceptic than I, and you know my predilection for the simple life, frank, wholesome, normally developing; one may say, happy in the pagan manner. But this mode of life does not exhaust life, though I believe it to conform most perfectly to the destiny of man. Life has acquired other dispositions, other tendencies. And this does not prevent asceticism, for instance, attractive as it is, from having at its base an incontestable psychological truth. In the present state of civilization we are not permitted to allow inconsistencies of which nevertheless the world is composed. If you so much as mention two contradictory propositions you are accused of instability, if not of dishonesty. Each of us remains shut up in his little, partial, incomplete truth; that is why the human race seems to one inconsequential and sometimes stupid." "Come, explain yourself a little; how, for example, can one at the same time love pleasure and that which forbids it?" "The problem does appear to be insoluble; but observe that there are none like the greatly self-indulgent to recognize the importance of an event which consists in renouncing all pleasure. It is those who most intensely enjoy the exquisite things of life who are thrilled to their inmost souls at the sight of a voluntary death. I have been present, as a relative, or as a mere onlooker, at more than one taking of the veil. Think what the taking of the veil must be to a beautiful young girl! Well, fathers excepted, I have never seen tears in the eyes of men professing the same faith as the novice, but I have seen robust artists almost faint at the sight. They were wholly indifferent to the person who was thus leaving the world, but they adored beauty and love. They believed in nothing else than beauty and love, and they were the only ones in the company to be overwhelmed by the power of the motive that can tear a human being away from the attraction of such a magnet. These unbelievers, these intruders in the temple, experienced such a shock that they came nearer to fervent adherence to a God to them unknown than the men of tranquil faith, who looked upon the ceremony as something usual and in conformity with the order of things. Ardent converts are not recruited from among the friends of religion, but from among its declared enemies or those totally ignorant of it." XXII Odette must leave a card with a word of sympathy at the door of the bereaved Rose, and see her, stand by her, try, however vainly, to console her. Fortunately Simone overpowered both Rose and Odette with her chatter. She was as well-informed, as in the time of peace, of everything that went on in private life. Mathilde Aviron--another Germaine Le Gault--was in love with a deputy. "But," said Odette, "she lost her husband only four weeks after me." "That is two years and two months ago, my dear!" "That is true."