seen and heard.

After she had explained her anxiety about the doctor and its
consequences, she continued that the apparition which the doctor had
invoked was the Spirit of Truth. Whether it had been obedient to the
call she could not say, but, at any rate it had been no demon of hell-God
be praised--bringing a reek of the pit, and besides Satan was the Prince
of Lies and would consider himself insulted if he were called the Spirit
of Truth, moreover the spirit who had appeared to the doctor had behaved
in the most exemplary manner.

The master, too, had confessed with true Christian humility and self
reproach that he had sinned against the Spirit of Truth, to whom none the
less he had dedicated his body and soul, inasmuch as, influenced by his
great love for his wife, he had devoted himself to finding a remedy which
would cure her, and had thus become a traitor to the object of his life.

After this he had sprung up and held aloft his hand with the forefinger
extended and sworn to the spirit that nothing here after would seduce him
from the pursuit of the elixir which was to render Truth triumphant in
the world.

Fran Schimmel described how the doctor's eyes had glowed at these words,
and how he had looked as if an invisible hand had written "Truth" in
large letters upon his forehead. He would be as certain to reach his
goal as she would be to pray the holy saints for a peaceful death.

After a long silence and much consideration the only thing that Herr
Schimmel found to say in answer to these important revelations was: "It
is all the same to me," to which his dear wife, with like brevity, and