Thus, there is something in every one of us to punish; and sometimes the Lord sees fit to chasten His best-loved servants so severely, that it is difficult to distinguish their chastisement from His judgments on the wicked." "That comes to what I was saying," said La Croissette; "that there is but one event to the good and to the bad." "It seems so, though it is not so," said I."But don't you perceive in this a grand argument in favor of a future life ?" "I am no scholar, I;--you must explain it to me," said La Croissette.
"If the Lord lets his dear children fall into the same afflictions here as the rebellious and impenitent, it is because He knows that in the long run, it will be to their advantage rather than otherwise: that they will turn their trials to such good account as actually to be the better for them; and that their light affliction, which is but for a moment, will work for them a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.
So that hereafter they shall look back on their present pains, not only with indifference but with thankfulness.

But ah! where shall then the unrighteous and sinner appear ?" "You seem to have a natural gift for preaching," said La Croissette, after a pause.

"Where will they appear, say you?
Why, if our priests are to be believed, those of them, even the very worst, who have money enough to pay for masses and indulgences, may buy themselves off from purgatory, and shine in glory with the best." "Does not that carry incredibility and absurdity on the very face of it ?" "It seems very hard on the poor man who can't buy himself off," said La Croissette.

"You Huguenots, then, don't believe in it ?" "Most assuredly not.

God accepts no prayers that do not spring from a lowly and contrite heart: and they may be offered by a poor man as well as a rich one." "But does not a poor man's soul require those purgatorial fires ?" "Oh no, my dear La Croissette! The Son of God told of no purgatory--only of heaven and hell.