In fact he suggested a number of excuses
for me, none of which happened to suit my case, till at length he
bethought himself of asking me whether I did not find it difficult
to sleep without taking supper. "Yes, my good father," said I; "and
for that reason I am obliged often to take a refreshment at mid-day
and supper at night."
"I am extremely happy," he replied, "to have found out a way of
relieving you without sin: go in peace- you are under no obligation to
fast. However, I would not have you depend on my word: step this way
to the library."
On going thither with me he took up a book, exclaiming with
great rapture, "Here is the authority for you: and, by my
conscience, such an authority! It is Escobar!"
"Who is Escobar?" I inquired.
"What! not know Escobar! " cried the monk; "the member of our
Society who compiled this Moral Theology from twenty-four of our
fathers, and on this founds an analogy, in his preface, between his
book and 'that in the Apocalypse which was sealed with seven seals,'
and states that 'Jesus presents it thus sealed to the four living
creatures, Suarez, Vasquez, Molina, and Valencia, in presence of the
four-and-twenty Jesuits who represent the four-and-twenty elders.'"
He read me, in fact, the whole of that allegory, which he
pronounced to be admirably appropriate, and which conveyed to my
mind a sublime idea of the exellence of the work. At length, having
sought out the passage of fasting, "Oh, here it is!" he said;
"treatise I, example 13, no.
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