nture able to make good
if it came to the point, yet I perceive not that he doth in that
thought any deadly displeasure unto God. For St. Peter, though he
said more than he could perform, yet in his so saying offended not
God greatly neither. But his offence was when he did not afterward
so well as he said before. But now may this man be likely never to
fall in the peril of breaking that appointment, since of some ten
thousand that shall so examine themselves, never one shall fall in
the peril. And yet for them to have that good purpose all their
life seemeth me no more harm in the meanwhile than for a poor
beggar who hath never a penny to think that, if he had great
substance, he would give great alms for God's sake.

But now is all the peril if the man answer himself that he would in
such case rather forsake the faith of Christ with his mouth and
keep it still in his heart than for the confessing of it to endure
a painful death. For by this mind he falleth in deadly sin, which
he never would have fallen in if he had never put himself the
question. But in good faith methinketh that he who, upon that
question put unto himself by himself, will make himself that
answer, hath the habit of faith so faint and so cold that, for the
better knowledge of himself and of his necessity to pray for more
strength of grace, he had need to have the question put to him
either by himself or by some other man.

Besides this, to counsel a man never to think on that question is,
to my mind, as reasonable as the medicine that I have heard taught
someone for the toothache: to go thrice about a churchyard, and
never think on a fox-tail! For if the counsel be not given them, it
cannot serve them. And if it be given them, it must put the point
of the matter in their mind. And forthwith to reject it, and think
therein neither one thing nor the other, is a thing that may be
sooner bidden than obeyed.

I think also that very few men can escape it. For though they would
never think on it by themselves, yet in one place or another where
they shall happen to come in company, they shall have the question
by adventure so proposed and put forth that--like as, while a man
heareth someone talking to him, he can close his eyes if he will,
but he cannot make himself sleep--so shall they, whether they will
or not, think one thing or the other therein.

Finally, when Christ spoke so often and so plain of the matter,
that every man should, upon pain of da