"Your son-in-law, I think," answered Pic.

"Eh! how can you believe such folly?"

"I believe it through faith."

"But do you not know quite well that a man who is impotent does not make
children?"

"Faith consists," returned Pic, "in believing things because they are
impossible; and, further, the honour of your house demands that
Lucretia's son shall not pass as the fruit of an incest. You make me
believe more incomprehensible mysteries. Have I not to be convinced that
a serpent spoke, that since then all men have been damned, that Balaam's
she-ass also spoke very eloquently, and that the walls of Jericho fell
at the sound of trumpets?" Pic forthwith ran through a litany of all
the admirable things he believed.

Alexander fell on his sofa by dint of laughing.

"I believe all that like you," he said, "for I know well that only by
faith can I be saved, and that I shall not be saved by my works."

"Ah! Holy Father," said Pic, "you have need of neither works nor faith;
that is good for poor profane people like us; but you who are vice-god
can believe and do all you want to. You have the keys of heaven; and
without a doubt St. Peter will not close the door in your face. But for
myself, I avow I should need potent protection if, being only a poor
prince, I had slept with my daughter, and if I had used the stiletto and