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son, testifies against Tartuffe’s scandalous behavior with Elmire. Cleante continues to offer Orgon sage advice and Elmire conspires to set a trap for Tartuffe where Orgon can witness firsthand the ungrateful hypocrite’s actions. Dorine and Orgon almost come to blows, Damis is banished, and Cleante is ignored. Only Elmire succeeds. She hides Orgon under a table while pretending to play along with Tartuffe’s advances. Even when Orgon witnesses Tartuffe’s treachery firsthand it takes him a while to accept it. Elmire, by this time, has so little faith in her husband that she begins to think he is going to stay under the table and let Tartuffe ravish her. The turning point in the play is when Orgon comes out and confronts Tartuffe. Tartuffe, rather than accept that he has been caught, vows that he will have Orgon’s property yet. Since he now controls Orgon’s property, he arranges to have Orgon’s family evicted. Only the king’s benevolent intervention saves Orgon’s family and Tartuffe is arrested. With this tidy conclusion, Moliere not only conforms to the standard for comedies of his day, but also shows that religious hypocrisy will lose in the end. When Tartuffe was seen for what he really was, he was despised by one and all. Religious leaders saw the scrutiny that this play would cause them to be subjected to and caused it to be banned for that reason. But, as in the play, justice won out in the end and the play was exhibited freely after five years of bondage. The fact that religious leaders could keep “Tartuffe” banned for so long shows that they had power in realms not normally delegated to religious officials.