Grace

When he told his wife of his dismissal, she asked him what he intended to do from then on.

"It seems like the right time to succumb to the sin of avarice," he replied gaily.

Of all the mortal sins, it turned out that avarice was the one which required the greatest strength of will. For someone who isn't greedy, it's a vice which is much harder to slide into than the others. When it stems from a conscious resolve, there's no way to distinguish it, at least in the early stages, from that excellent virtue of thriftiness. Duperrier imposed harsh disciplines on himself, such as keeping up his gluttony, and he managed to establish a solid reputation of avarice among his neighbors and acquaintances. He truly loved money for itself, and he learned better than anyone how to savor that wicked anguish that misers feel, knowing that they possess a creative force and that they prevent it from being exercised. As he counted his savings, the fruit of a heretofore laborious existence, he managed, little by little, to experience the frightful pleasure of wronging others by diverting a current of exchange and of life. This result, precisely because it took a lot of effort to achieve, gave Mme. Duperrier great hope. Since her husband had given in so easily to the lure of the other sins, God surely wouldn't hold this one against him, she reasoned, with such primal candor that she really made a rather pitiful victim. In actuality, his studied and patient progress in avarice resulted (necessarily) from a perverse drive which seemed to defy heaven. Despite this, even when Duperrier had grown so miserly that he put buttons from his underwear into the parish donation box, the gleam and thickness of his halo remained intact. Upon recognizing this new failure, the couple were left feeling helpless for several days.