did not want to bow to the dead; he called the church the priests' bank,
the altar a parade of mountebanks, the confessional the antechamber to the
brothel.

"That man will perish on the scaffold!" the former Curé of the village
cried out one day in righteous indignation.

How had he come by this hatred, vigorous as that which Alcestis demands
from virtuous souls against hypocrites and evil-doers? What had the
_black-coats_ done to him? He did not say, and perhaps he would have been
embarrassed to say. There are certain natures which will love at any price,
there are others on the contrary which need to hate. He was doubtless one
of the latter, and he discharged all his excess of gall on the servants of
Jesus.

"They are criminals," he cried, "all without exception, from the first to
the last. Hypocrisy engenders wickedness. It is a sore which spreads and
becomes leprosy. Everything which touches it catches it. Those who
associate with hypocrites become hypocrites, and then scoundrels, slowly
but surely by infection. That is the logic of the scab. It is not necessary
to dress up in a black gown and to swallow God in public to make a perfect
priestling, it is enough to rub against the priest's cap. Look at the
sacristans, the beadles, the lackeys of the Bishop's palace, the hirers of
chairs, the choir-men, the sellers of tapers, the tradesmen by appointment
to the religious houses, the beggar who stretches out his hand to you at
the door, and the man who hands you the holy-water sprinkler, have they not
all the same hypocritical face, the same cunning, devoutly sanctimonious
look? Well! scratch the skins of the godly and you will find the hide of
the scoundrel."