Page 100 - les-miserables

CHAPTER XIV

WHAT HE THOUGHT

One last word.
Since this sort of details might, particularly at the present
moment, and to use an expression now in fashion, give to
the Bishop of D—— a certain ‘pantheistical’ physiognomy,
and induce the belief, either to his credit or discredit, that
he entertained one of those personal philosophies which are
peculiar to our century, which sometimes spring up in soli-
tary spirits, and there take on a form and grow until they
usurp the place of religion, we insist upon it, that not one
of those persons who knew Monseigneur Welcome would
have thought himself authorized to think anything of the
sort. That which enlightened this man was his heart. His
wisdom was made of the light which comes from there.
No systems; many works. Abstruse speculations contain
vertigo; no, there is nothing to indicate that he risked his
mind in apocalypses. The apostle may be daring, but the
bishop must be timid. He would probably have felt a scru-
ple at sounding too far in advance certain problems which
are, in a manner, reserved for terrible great minds. There is
a sacred horror beneath the porches of the enigma; those

100 Les Miserables