brother, and let us go on till we find out our Master’s deep and loving mind.  But, instead of saying that, Christian and Hopeful soon became like the children of Israel as they journeyed from Mount Hor, their soul was much discouraged because of the way.  And always as they went on they wished for a softer and a better way.  And it was so that they very soon came to the very thing they so much wished for.  For, what is that on the left hand of the hard road but a stile, and over the stile a meadow as soft to the feet as the meadow of lilies itself? ’’Tis just according to my wish,’ said Christian; ’here is the easiest going.  Come, good Hopeful, and let us go over.’  Hopeful:  ’But how if the path should lead us out of the way?’ ‘That’s not like,’ said the other; ’look, doth it not go along by the wayside?’ So Hopeful, being persuaded by his fellow, went after him over the stile.

Call to mind, all you who are delivered and restored pilgrims, that same stile that once seduced you.  To keep that stile ever before you is at once a safe and a seemly occupation of mind for any one who has made your mistakes and come through your chastisements.  Christian’s eyes all his after-days filled with tears, and he turned away his face and blushed scarlet, as often as he suddenly came upon any opening in a wall at all like that opening he here persuaded Hopeful to climb through.  It is too much to expect that those who are just mounting the stile, and have just caught sight of the smooth path beyond it, will let themselves be pulled back into the hard and narrow way by any persuasion of ours.  Christian put down Hopeful’s objection till Hopeful broke out bitterly when the thunder was roaring over his head and he was wading about among the dark waters:  ‘Oh that I had kept myself in my way!’ Are you a little sorry to-night that the river and the way are parting in your life?  Is your soul discouraged in you because of the soreness of the way?  And as you go do you still wish for some better way than the strait way?  And have you just espied a stile on the left hand of your narrow and flinty path, and on looking over it is there a pleasant meadow?  And does your companion point out to your satisfaction, and, almost to your good conscience, that the soft road runs right along the hard road, only over the stile and outside the fence?  Then, good-bye.  For it is all over with you.  We shall meet you again, please God; but when we meet you again, your mind and memory will be full of shame and remorse and suffering enough to keep you in songs of repentance for all the rest of your life on earth.  Farewell!

   The Pilgrims now, to gratify the flesh,
   Will seek its ease; but oh! how they afresh
   Do thereby plunge themselves new grieves into: 
   Who seek to please the flesh themselves undo.