women."

He replied with solemnity:

"Madame, you may collect the grain of calumiy sown by Monsieur Paul Vence
and throw handfuls of it at me. I will not try to avoid it. It is not
necessary you should know that I am chaste and that my mind is pure.
But do not judge lightly those whom you call unfortunate, and who should
be sacred to you, since they are unfortunate. The disdained and lost
girl is the docile clay under the finger of the Divine Potter: she is the
victim and the altar of the holocaust. The unfortunates are nearer God
than the honest women: they have lost conceit. They do not glorify
themselves with the untried virtue the matron prides herself on.
They possess humility, which is the cornerstone of virtues agreeable to
heaven. A short repentance will be sufficient for them to be the first
in heaven; for their sins, without malice and without joy, contain their
own forgiveness. Their faults, which are pains, participate in the
merits attached to pain; slaves to brutal passion, they are deprived of
all voluptuousness, and in this they are like the men who practise
continence for the kingdom of God. They are like us, culprits; but shame
falls on their crime like a balm, suffering purifies it like fire. That
is the reason why God will listen to the first voice which they shall
send to him. A throne is prepared for them at the right hand of the
Father. In the kingdom of God, the queen and the empress will be happy
to sit at the feet of the unfortunate; for you must not think that the
celestial house is built on a human plan. Far from it, Madame."

Nevertheless, he conceded that more than one road led to salvation. One
could follow the road of love.