"Else I had reckoned more of that of others," said the
predestinarian--"What is death?--it is but ceasing to live--And what
is living?--a weary return of light and darkness, sleeping and waking,
being hungered and eating. Your dead man needs neither candle nor can,
neither fire nor feather-bed; and the joiner's chest serves him for an
eternal frieze-jerkin."
"Wretched man! believest thou not that after death comes the
judgment?"
"Lady," answered Dryfesdale, "as my mistress, I may not dispute your
words; but, as spiritually speaking, you are still but a burner of
bricks in Egypt, ignorant of the freedom of the saints; for, as was
well shown to me by that gifted man, Nicolaus Schoefferbach, who was
martyred by the bloody Bishop of Munster, he cannot sin who doth but
execute that which is predestined, since--"
"Silence!" said the Lady, interrupting him,--"Answer me not with thy
bold and presumptuous blasphemy, but hear me. Thou hast been long the
servant of our house--"
"The born servant of the Douglas--they have had the best of me--I
served them since I left Lockerbie: I was then ten years old, and you
may soon add the threescore to it."
"Thy foul attempt has miscarried, so thou art guilty only in
intention. It were a deserved deed to hang thee on the warder's
tower; and yet in thy present mind, it were but giving a soul to
Satan. I take thine offer, then--Go hence--here is my packet--I will
add to it but a line, to desire him to send me a faithful servant or
two to complete the garrison.
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