Then the priest seemed to become impatient, and in a voice trembling with annoyance and anger he again resumed. He spoke of the duties of parents towards their child, of God's wrath against an unforgiving temper, and said plainly that marriage was not meant to be merely a means of carnal indulgence or of increasing the population, but also--and he laid emphasis on this--of family education. He gave them till the following Sunday to think it over, and bade them depart in peace.
No sooner had he spoken the last word and made a gesture of dismissal with his hand, than the young wife turned and departed. Coldly and calmly she passed between the rows of the congregation, and disappeared through the great entrance. The man hesitated a moment, then he sought the smaller door at the end of the transept.
As the priest walked home with his wife, who had been present at Mass, she said to him in a gentle but reproachful tone: "Did you believe what you said?"
"You are my conscience, dear woman, and you know my thoughts; spare me therefore a little, for the spoken word smites like a scourge."
"Then let the scourge smite! You know by their confessions that the union of this married pair is no true marriage, you know that this woman is a martyr whose life can only be saved by her keeping away from this man; you know this, and yet you exhort her to go towards her destruction."
"The Church, you see, my friend, has higher aims than the well-being of ordinary people."
"I thought that the well-being of men, what you call their salvation, was the highest aim of the Church. What then is the Church's highest aim?"
"The increase of God's kingdom on earth," answered the priest after some reflection.
"Let us consider!" said his wife. "It is said that only the saved shall dwell in God's Kingdom. Then the Church is to save men."
"In the higher sense; are there then two?"
"A little foolish woman can ask more questions than seven wise men can answer," said the priest, and pressed his wife's hand.
"Then it is a bad look-out for the wisdom of the wise, for what will they answer when an intelligent person asks--when all the intelligent people in the world come and ask?" continued the foolish little woman.
"They will answer that they do not know," whispered the priest.