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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from An Episode Under the Terror by Honore de Balzac: The stranger's fervor was sincere. One emotion blended the prayers of
the four servants of God and the King in a single supplication. The
holy words rang like the music of heaven through the silence. At one
moment, tears gathered in the stranger's eyes. This was during the
Pater Noster; for the priest added a petition in Latin, and his
audience doubtless understood him when he said: "Et remitte scelus
regicidis sicut Ludovicus eis remisit semetipse"--forgive the
regicides as Louis himself forgave them.
The Sisters saw two great tears trace a channel down the stranger's
manly checks and fall to the floor. Then the office for the dead was
recited; the Domine salvum fac regem chanted in an undertone that went
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