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The Vicomte De Bragelonne
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The Vicomte De Bragelonne 619 at Prostate Health
and you
possess royal blood, since no one has dared to shed yours, as your
servants has been shed. Now see, then, what this Providence, which you
have so often accused of having in every way thwarted you, has done for
you. It has given you the features, figure, age, and voice of your
brother; and the very causes of your persecution are about to become
those of your triumphant restoration. To-morrow, after to-morrow--from
the very first, regal phantom, living shade of Louis XIV., you will sit
upon his throne, whence the will of Heaven, confided in execution to the
arm of man, will have hurled him, without hope of return."
"I understand," said the prince, "my brothers blood will not be shed,
then."
"You will be sole arbiter of his fate."
"The secret of which they made an evil use against me?"
"You will employ it against him. What did he do to conceal it? He
concealed you. Living image of himself, you will defeat the conspiracy
of Mazarin and Anne of Austria. You, my prince, will have the same
interest in concealing him, who will, as a prisoner, resemble you, as
you will resemble him as king."
"I fall back on what I was saying to you. Who will guard him?"
"Who guarded you?"
"You know this secret--you have made use of it with regard to myself.
Who else knows it?"
"The queen-mother and Madame de Chevreuse."
"What will they do?"
"Nothing, if you choose."
"How is that?"
"How can they recognize you, if you act in a manner that no one can
recognize you?"
"Tis true: but there are grave difficulties."
"State them, prince."
"My brother is married; I cannot take my brothers wife."
"I will cause Spain to consent to a divorce; it is in the interest of
your new policy; it is human morality. All that is really noble and
really useful in this world will find its account therein."
"The imprisoned king will speak."
"To whom do you think he should speak--to the walls?"
"You mean, by walls, the men in whom you put confidence."
"If need be, yes. And besides, your royal highness--"
"Besides?"
"I was going to say that the designs of Providence do not stop on such a
fair road. Every scheme of this caliber is completed by its results,
like a geometrical calculation. The king, in prison, will not be for you
the cause of embarrassment that you have been for the king enthroned.
His soul is naturally proud and impatient; it is, moreover, disarmed and
enfeebled, by being accustomed to honors, and by the license of supreme
power. The same Providence which has willed that the concluding step in
the geometrical calculation I have had the honor of describing to your
royal highness should be your accession to the throne, and the
destruction of him who is hurtful to you, has also determined that the
conquered one shall soon end both his own and your sufferings.
Therefore, his soul and body have been adapted for but a brief agony.
Put into prison as a private individual, left alone with your doubts,
deprived of everything, you have exhibited a solid, enduring principle
of life, in withstanding all this. But your brother, a captive,
forgotten, and in bonds, will not long-endure the calamity; and Heaven
will resume his soul at the appointed time--that is to say, _soon_."
At this point in Aramis gloomy analysis, a bird of night uttered from
the depths of the forest that prolonged and plaintive cry which makes
every creature tremble.
"I will exile the deposed king," said Philippe, shuddering; "twill be
more humane."
"The kings good pleasure will decide the point," said Aramis. "But has
the problem been well put? Have I brought out the solution according to
the wishes or the foresight of your royal highness?"
"Yes, monsieur, yes; you have forgotten nothing--except, indeed, two
things."
"The first?"
"Let us speak of it at once, with the same frankness we have already
conversed in. Let us speak of the causes which may bring about the ruin
of all the hopes we have conceived. Let us speak of the risks we are
running."
"They would be immense, infinite, terrific, insurmountable, if, as I
have said, all things did not concur in rendering them of absolutely no
account. There is no danger either for you or for me, if the constancy
and intrepidity of your royal highness are equal to that perfection of
resemblance to your brother which nature has bestowed upon you. I repeat
it, there are no dangers, only obstacles; a word, indeed, which I find
in all languages, but have always ill-understood,
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