He was there, praying as on that other night, alone, on the hillside.

He was there, saying with His sweet eternal voice: "Come unto Me all ye who suffer, all ye who are heavy laden, come unto Me." He was there and speaking, the living Christ: "Believe in Me, for I am with you; I am your strength, and I am peace.

I the Humble, son of the Almighty; I the Meek, son of the Terrible; I who prepare hearts for the kingdom of justice, for the future union of all with Me in My Father." He, the Merciful, was there in the tabernacle, breathing the ineffable invitation: "Come, open thy heart; give thyself up to Me!" And Clemente gave himself up, confiding to Him what he had never confessed even to himself.

He felt that everything in the ancient monastery was dying, save Christ in the tabernacle.

As the germ-cell of ecclesiastical organism, the centre from which Christian warmth irradiates upon the world, the monastery was becoming ossified by the action of inexorable age.