"Pardon me," said Delsarte; "I really cannot stay! I had forgotten that
Brucker was to dine with me."
"But that can be arranged! M. Brucker can join us. Suppose we send and
ask him?"
"You need not," replied the master; "if you are willing, I will call
him; he is waiting for me below at the corner."
They had acted as children do, when one says to the other on leaving
school:
"Wait a minute for me, I'll ask mamma if you can come and dine with us."
Brucker, who after all knew how to be agreeable when he chose, took his
place at the table, and all went well.
This proves yet once again the extent to which Delsarte possessed that
charming simplicity so well suited to all distinction.
In the dissertations upon religious subjects incessantly renewed about
Delsarte, it was sometimes declared that "great sinners were surer of
salvation than the most perfect unbelievers in the world."
A young man, who doubtless felt himself to be in the first category,
once said to the master:
"My friend, the good God has been too kind to me! I disobey him, I
offend against his laws.... I repent, and he accepts my prayer! I
relapse into sin--and he forgives me! Decidedly, the good God is a very
poltroon!"
This seems to exceed the unrestrained ease and confidence usual toward
an earthly father; but we must not forget that the inflection modifies
the meaning of a phrase, and that _poltroon_ may mean _adorable_.
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