the keys and opening those portals to human souls; all the ancient
symbolism was revived, freed at last from the stains of royalty here
below.

"Oh! I beg you, Holy Father," resumed Pierre, "if an example be needed
strike none other than myself. I have come, and am here; decide my fate,
but do not aggravate my punishment by filling me with remorse at having
brought condemnation on the innocent."

Leo XIII still refrained from replying, though he continued to look at
the young priest with burning eyes. And he, Pierre, no longer beheld Leo
XIII, the last of a long line of popes, the Vicar of Jesus Christ, the
Successor of the Prince of the Apostles, the Supreme Pontiff of the
Universal Church, Patriarch of the East, Primate of Italy, Archbishop and
Metropolitan of the Roman Province, Sovereign of the Temporal Domains of
the Holy Church; he saw the Leo XIII that he had dreamt of, the awaited
saviour who would dispel the frightful cataclysm in which rotten society
was sinking. He beheld him with his supple, lofty intelligence and
fraternal, conciliatory tactics, avoiding friction and labouring to bring
about unity whilst with his heart overflowing with love he went straight
to the hearts of the multitude, again giving the best of his blood in
sign of the new alliance. He raised him aloft as the sole remaining moral
authority, the sole possible bond of charity and peace--as the Father, in
fact, who alone could stamp out injustice among his children, destroy
misery, and re-establish the liberating Law of Work by bringing the
nations back to the faith of the primitive Church, the gentleness and the
wisdom of the true Christian community. And in the deep silence of that
room the great figure which he thus set up assumed invincible
all-powerfulness, extraordinary majesty.