"God bless you, my children, God bless you," said the Cure, in answer
to the various greetings he received from his flock. "Follow me, my
children, and we will worship God beneath the canopy of his holy
throne," and then turning to the stranger, he added: "the next time you
visit me at St. Laud's, M. d'Elbee, we shall, I doubt not, have our
church again. I could now desire the people to force the doors for me,
and no one would dare to hinder them; but I have been thrust from my
altar and pulpit by a self-constituted vain authority--but yet by
authority; and I will not resume them till I do so by the order of the
King or of his servants."
"I reverence the house of God," replied M. d'Elbee, "because his spirit
has sanctified it; but walls and pillars are not necessary to my
worship; a cross beneath a rock is as perfect a church to them who have
the will to worship, as though they had above them the towers of Notre
Dame, or the dome of St. Peter's."
"You are right, my son; it is the heart that God regards; and where that
is in earnest, his mercy will dispense with the outward symbols of our
religion; but still it is our especial duty to preserve to his use
everything which the piety of former ages has sanctified; to part
willingly with nothing which appertains in any.
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