Fai.—"Yes, I met with one Discontent, who would fain have me to go back once more with him: his cause was, for that the vale did not bear a good name."
Chr.—"Met you with naught else in that vale?"
Fai.—"Yes, I met with Shame: but of all men that I met with in my way, he, I think, bears the wrong name."
Chr.—"Why, what did he say to you?"
Fai.—"What! Why, he did flout at faith. He said it was a poor, low, mean thing for a man to mind faith; he said that a soul that shrinks from sin is not fit for a man. He said, too, that but few of the great, rich, or wise held my views; nor did those till they were led to be fools, and to be of a free mind to run the loss of all for none else knows what. More than this, he said such were of a base and low caste, and knew naught of those things which are the boast of the wise. Yea, he did hold me to it that it was a shame to ask grace of folk for slight faults, or to give back that which I did take. He said, too, that faith made a man grow strange to the great, and made him own and prize the base: 'and is not this,' said he, 'a shame?'"
Chr.—"And what did you say to him?"
FAITHFUL RESISTS SHAME.
Fai.—"Say! I could not tell what to say at first. Yea, he put me so to it that my blood came up in my face; aye, this Shame did fetch it up, and had, too, beat me quite off. But at last I thought that that which men prize was base in the sight of God. Hence, thought I, what God says is best, is best, though all the men in the world are foes to it. As, then, God likes his faith; as God likes a soul that shrinks from sin; and as they are most wise who wear the guise of fools to gain a crown: and that the poor man that loves Christ more rich than the man that sways a world, that hates him; Shame, go thy way, thou art a foe to my soul's weal. But, in sooth, this Shame was a bold knave; I could scarce shake him out of my way: but at last I told him it was but in vain to strive with me from that time forth. And when I shook him off, then I sang—
"The tests that those men meet, with all men else
That bow their wills to the high call of God,
Are great; and well, I wist, do suit the flesh,
And come, and come, and come e'en yet once more;
That now, or some time else, we by them may
Be held in thrall, flung down, and cast sheer off:
O, let those in the way, let all such, then,
Be sharp, and quick, and quit them like true men."