I was compelled, however, to create a fresh existence for myself in this world so little adapted for me.  I need not trouble you with an account of these complications, which would be as uninteresting to you as they were painful to myself.  You may picture me spending whole days in going from one person to another.  I was ashamed of myself, but necessity knows no law.  Man does not live by bread alone; but he cannot live without bread.  But through it all I never ceased to keep my eyes fixed heavenwards.

I will merely tell you that in compliance with the advice of M. Carbon, and for another peremptory reason of which I will speak to you later on, I thought it best to refuse several rather tempting proposals, and to accept in the preparatory school annexed to the Stanislas College, a humble post which in several respects harmonised very well with my present position.  This situation did not take up more than an hour and a half of my time each day, and I had the advantage of making use of special courses of mathematics, physics, etc., to say nothing of preparatory lectures for the M.A. degree, one of which was delivered twice a week, by M. Lenormant I was agreeably surprised at finding so much frank and cordial geniality among these young people; and I can safely say that I never had anything approaching to a misunderstanding while there, and that I left the school with sincere regret.  But the most remarkable incident in this period of my life were beyond all doubt my relations with M. Gratry, the director of the college.  I shall have much to tell you about him, and I am delighted at having made his acquaintance.  He is the very miniature of M. Bautain, of whom he is the pupil and friend.  We became very friendly from the first, and from that time forward we stood upon a footing towards one another which has never had its like before, so far as I am concerned.  In many matters our ideas harmonised wonderfully; he, like myself, is governed wholly by philosophy.  He is, upon the whole, a man of remarkably speculative mind; but upon certain points there is a hollow ring about him.  How came it then, you will ask, that I was obliged to throw up a post which, taking it altogether, suited me fairly well, and in which I could so easily pursue my present plans?  This, I must tell you, is one of the most curious incidents in my life; I should find it almost impossible to make any one understand it, and I do not believe that any one ever has thoroughly understood it.  It was once more a question of duty.  Yes, the same reason which compelled me to leave St. Sulpice and to refuse the Carmelite establishment obliged me to leave the Stanislas College.  M. Dupanloup and M. Manier impelled me onward; onward I went, and I had to start afresh.  It seems as if I were fated ever to encounter strange adventures, and I should be very glad that I had met with this particular one, if for no other reason for the peculiar positions in which it placed me, and which were the means of my making a considerable addition to my store of knowledge.