All this, of course, I now understand to have been rehearsed before; but just at that time I had no more than a suspicion that this was so.
When he had finished, His Holiness once more turned and looked at me; and I upon the ground: and then at last he spoke.
"My son," he said, "you have heard what his Reverence has said of you; and I too have heard it, and not to-day for the first time.

It seems that you are right in thinking that for the present at any rate you have no vocation to Holy Religion.

Well, then, the question is as to what is your Vocation, for Our Lord never leaves any man without a Vocation of some kind.

You are very young for such service as that on which we think to send you; for we shall send you to the Court of England first, and then perhaps now and again to France; but you look five years at least older than your age, and, I am told, have ten times its discretion.

I need not tell you that you will have no very heavy mission given to you at first; you must mix freely with the world and use your wits and see what is best to be done, sending back reports to the Cardinal Secretary.
You will live at your own charges, as you yourself have said that you wished to do; but you may draw upon us here for any journeys that you may undertake upon our business up to a certain amount.