Chr.  But, said Christian, will your practice stand a trial at law?

Form. and HYP.  They told him, That custom, it being of so long a standing as above a thousand years, would, doubtless, now be admitted as a thing legal by any impartial judge; and besides, said they, if we get into the way, what’s matter which way we get in? if we are in, we are in; thou art but in the way, who, as we perceive, came in at the gate; and we are also in the way, that came tumbling over the wall; wherein, now, is thy condition better than ours?

Chr.  I walk by the rule of my Master; you walk by the rude working of your fancies.  You are counted thieves already, by the Lord of the way; therefore, I doubt you will not be found true men at the end of the way.  You come in by yourselves, without his direction; and shall go out by yourselves, without his mercy.

{100} To this they made him but little answer; only they bid him look to himself.  Then I saw that they went on every man in his way without much conference one with another, save that these two men told Christian, that as to laws and ordinances, they doubted not but they should as conscientiously do them as he; therefore, said they, we see not wherein thou differest from us but by the coat that is on thy back, which was, as we trow, given thee by some of thy neighbours, to hide the shame of thy nakedness.

{101} Chr.  By laws and ordinances you will not be saved, since you came not in by the door. [Gal. 2:16] And as for this coat that is on my back, it was given me by the Lord of the place whither I go; and that, as you say, to cover my nakedness with.  And I take it as a token of his kindness to me; for I had nothing but rags before.  And besides, thus I comfort myself as I go:  Surely, think I, when I come to the gate of the city, the Lord thereof will know me for good since I have this coat on my back —­ a coat that he gave me freely in the day that he stripped me of my rags.  I have, moreover, a mark in my forehead, of which, perhaps, you have taken no notice, which one of my Lord’s most intimate associates fixed there in the day that my burden fell off my shoulders.  I will tell you, moreover, that I had then given me a roll, sealed, to comfort me by reading as I go on the way; I was also bid to give it in at the Celestial Gate, in token of my certain going in after it; all which things, I doubt, you want, and want them because you came not in at the gate.

{102} To these things they gave him no answer; only they looked upon each other, and laughed.  Then, I saw that they went on all, save that Christian kept before, who had no more talk but with himself, and that sometimes sighingly, and sometimes comfortably; also he would be often reading in the roll that one of the Shining Ones gave him, by which he was refreshed.