blood of Jesus Christ. Therefore all my consecrations were invalid, and
unknown to us, my faithful and myself had for forty years been deprived
of the sacrament and were in fact in a state of excommunication. This
revelation threw me into a stupor which overwhelms me even to-day in
this abode of bliss. I go all through Paradise without ever meeting
a single one of those Christians whom formerly I admitted to the holy
table in the basilica of the blessed Modestus. Deprived of the bread of
angels, they easily gave way to the most abominable vices, and they have
all gone to hell. It gives me some satisfaction to think that Barjas,
the tavern-keeper, is damned. There is in these things a logic worthy of
the author of all logic. Nevertheless my unhappy example proves that it
is sometimes inconvenient that form should prevail over essence in the
sacraments, and I humbly ask, Could not, eternal wisdom remedy this?"

"No," answered the Lord. "The remedy would be worse than the disease.
It would be the ruin of the priesthood if essence prevailed over form in
the laws of salvation."

"Alas! Lord," sighed the humble Probus. "Be persuaded by my humble
experience; as long as you reduce your sacraments to formulas your
justice will meet with terrible obstacles."

"I know that better than you do," replied the Lord. "I see in a single
glance both the actual problems which are difficult, and the future
problems which will not be less difficult. Thus I can foretell that when
the sun will have turned round the earth two hundred and forty times
more.

"Sublime language," exclaimed the angels.