The second example is the stern stateliness of unshaken heroism with which he confronts insult and threats of torture and death, when, chained and baited by the soldiers, Sarnem bids him down on his knees and beg for mercy. They try to force him to the ground, inciting one another with cowardly ferocity to strike him, put out his eyes, or lop off a limb. His bearing and the soul it revealed were such as corresponded with the descriptive comment wrung from the onlooking Gesler:
"Can I believe my eyes? He smiles. He grasps
His chains as he would make a weapon of them
To lay his smiter dead. What kind of man
Is this, that looks in thraldom more at large
Than they who lay it on him!
A heart accessible as his to trembling
The rock or marble hath. They more do fear
To inflict than he to suffer. Each one calls
Upon the other to accomplish that