"The Marquis de La Tour d'Azyr said of him that he had too dangerous
a gift of eloquence. It was to silence his brave voice that he
killed him. But he has failed of his object. For I, poor Philippe
de Vilmorin's friend, have assumed the mantle of his apostleship,
and I speak to you with his voice to-day."
It was a statement that helped Le Chapelier at last to understand,
at least in part, this bewildering change in Andre-Louis, which
rendered him faithless to the side that employed him.
"I am not here," continued Andre-Louis, "merely to demand at your
hands vengeance upon Philippe de Vilmorin's murderers. I am here
to tell you the things he would to-day have told you had he lived."
So far at least he was frank. But he did not add that they were
things he did not himself believe, things that he accounted the
cant by which an ambitious bourgeoisie - speaking through the mouths
of the lawyers, who were its articulate part - sought to overthrow
to its own advantage the present state of things. He left his
audience in the natural belief that the views he expressed were the
views he held.
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