HOPE. Be comforted, my brother, for I forgive thee; and believe,
too, that this shall be for our good.
CHR. I am glad I have with me a merciful brother; but we must not
stand thus: let us try to go back again.
HOPE. But, good brother, let me go before.
CHR. No, if you please, let me go first, that if there be any danger,
I may be first therein, because by my means we are both gone out
of the way.
{282} HOPE. No, said Hopeful, you shall not go first; for your
mind being troubled may lead you out of the way again. Then, for
their encouragement, they heard the voice of one saying, "Set thine
heart toward the highway, even the way which thou wentest; turn
again." [Jer. 31:21] But by this time the waters were greatly
risen, by reason of which the way of going back was very dangerous.
(Then I thought that it is easier going out of the way, when we
are in, than going in when we are out.) Yet they adventured to go
back, but it was so dark, and the flood was so high, that in their
going back they had like to have been drowned nine or ten times.
{283} Neither could they, with all the skill they had, get again to
the stile that night. Wherefore, at last, lighting under a little
shelter, they sat down there until the daybreak; but, being weary,
they fell asleep.
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