He understood how to say the grandest things in the most vulgar of idioms. As he spoke all tongues, he entered into all hearts.

Madame Magloire once said to him with a kind of gentle reproach: ‘Monseigneur, you are always anxious to make everything useful, but yet here is a plat that is of no use. It would be much better to have salads there than bouquets.’ ‘Madame Magloire,’ replied the bishop, ‘you are mistaken. The beautiful is as useful as the useful.’ He added, after a moment’s silence, ‘perhaps more so.’

This is the shade of meaning; the door of a physician should never be closed; the door of a priest should always be open.’