man, decoy one that is
virtuous, make overtures to one that is pure-minded, pay court to one
that is prudent? Yes, thou hast told me so. Then, if thou knowest that
thou hast a wife, modest, virtuous, pure-minded and prudent, what is it
that thou seekest? And if thou believest that she will come forth
victorious from all my attacks--as doubtless she would--what higher
titles than those she possesses now dost thou think thou canst upon her
then, or in what will she be better then than she is now? Either thou
dost not hold her to be what thou sayest, or thou knowest not what thou
dost demand. If thou dost not hold her to be what thou why dost thou seek
to prove her instead of treating her as guilty in the way that may seem
best to thee? but if she be as virtuous as thou believest, it is an
uncalled-for proceeding to make trial of truth itself, for, after trial,
it will but be in the same estimation as before. Thus, then, it is
conclusive that to attempt things from which harm rather than advantage
may come to us is the part of unreasoning and reckless minds, more
especially when they are things which we are not forced or compelled to
attempt, and which show from afar that it is plainly madness to attempt
them.

"Difficulties are attempted either for the sake of God or for the sake of
the world, or for both; those undertaken for God's sake are those which
the saints undertake when they attempt to live the lives of angels in
human bodies; those undertaken for the sake of the world are those of the
men who traverse such a vast expanse of water, such a variety of
climates, so many strange countries, to acquire what are called the
blessings of fortune; and those undertaken for the sake of God and the
world together are those of brave soldiers, who no sooner do they see in
the enemy's wall a breach as wide as a cannon ball could make, than,
casting aside all fear, without hesitating, or heeding the manifest peril
that threatens them, borne onward by the desire of defending their faith,
their country, and their king, they fling themselves dauntlessly into the
midst of the thousand opposing deaths that await them. Such are the
things that men are wont to attempt, and there is honour, glory, gain, in
attempting them, however full of difficulty and peril they may be; but
that which thou sayest it is thy wish to attempt and carry out will not
win thee the glory of God nor the blessings of fortune nor fame among
men; for even if the i