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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Elixir of Life by Honore de Balzac: of the reliquary in which Don Juan lay. The blasphemer's body
sparkled with gems, and flowers, and crystal, with diamonds and
gold, and plumes white as the wings of seraphim; they had set it
up on the altar, where the pictures of Christ had stood. All
about him blazed a host of tall candles; the air quivered in the
radiant light. The worthy Abbot of San-Lucar, in pontifical
robes, with his mitre set with precious stones, his rochet and
golden crosier, sat enthroned in imperial state among his clergy
in the choir. Rows of impassive aged faces, silver-haired old men
clad in fine linen albs, were grouped about him, as the saints
who confessed Christ on earth are set by painters, each in his
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