The Legate rose from his seat, and fixed his eyes upon the Prelate's face: "There are many kinds of oppressors, but the most infamous, are those who use the Church of God, as the engine of their atrocious crimes." This remark fell like a thunderbolt. The Prelate slowly rose from his chair, his face flushed and his chest heaving. "Sir!" he cried in a voice of thunder. "Nay--you need not raise your voice,--much less confront me with that frowning brow. You know me and know the position which I hold. You know that I am above your reach,--that, perchance, a word from me, uttered in the proper place, might stop your career, even at the threshold. I know you, and know that you belong to the party, which, for ages, has made our church the instrument of the most infernal wrongs--" "Sir!" again ejaculated the Prelate. "A party, whose noblest monument is made of the skeletons, the racks and thumbscrews of the Inquisition, and whose history can only be clearly read, save by the torchlight of St. Bartholomew--" "This from you, sir,--" "A party whose avowed atheism produced the French Revolution, and whose cloaked atheism is even now sowing the seeds of social hell-fire, in this country and in Europe--" "I swear, sir--" "Hear me, sir, for I am only here to read you a plain lesson. You, and men like you, may possibly convert the Church once more into the instrument of ferocious absolutism and the engine of colossal murder, but remember--" He flung his coat around him, and stood erect, his face even more deathly pale than usual, his eyes shining with clear and intense light. There was a grandeur in his attitude and look. "Remember, even in the moments of your bloodiest triumphs, that even within the Church of Rome, swayed by such as you, there is another Church of Rome, composed of men, who, when the hour strikes, will sacrifice everything to the cause of humanity and God." These words were pronounced slowly and deliberately, with an emphasis which drove the color from the Prelate's cheek. "Think of it, within Rome, a higher, mightier Rome,--within the order of Jesuits, a higher and mightier order of Jesuits--and whenever you, and such as you, turn, you will be met by men, who have sworn to use the Church, as the instrument of human progress, or to drive forward the movement over its ruins." He moved to the door, but lingered for a moment on the threshold: "It is a great way," he said, "from the turnpike to the Vatican." This he said, and disappeared. (The Prelate had risen from the position of breaker of stone on the public road, only to use all his efforts to crush and damn the masses from whom he sprung.) And the Prelate was now left alone, to pick up the thunderbolt which had fallen at his feet.