But now in good faith, cousin, if my migration into a strange country were any great grief unto me, the fault should be much in myself.  For since I am very sure that whithersoever man convey me, God is no more verily here than he shall be there, if I get (as I can, if I will) the grace to set mine whole heart upon him and long for nothing but him, it can then make no matter to my mind, whether they carry me hence or leave me here.  And then, if I find my mind much offended therewith, that I am not still here in mine own country, I must consider that the cause of my grief is mine own wrong imagination, whereby I beguile myself with an untrue persuasion, thinking that this were mine own country.  Whereas in truth it is not so, for, as St. Paul saith, “We have here no city nor dwelling-country at all, but we seek for one that we shall come to.”  And in whatsoever country we walk in this world, we are but as pilgrims and wayfaring men.  And if I should take any country for mine own, it must be the country to which I come and not the country from which I came.  That country, which shall be to me then for a while so strange, shall yet perdy be no more strange to me—­nor longer strange to me, neither—­than was mine own native country when first I came into it.  And therefore if my being far from hence be very grievous to me, and I find it a great pain that I am not where I wish to be, that grief shall in great part grow for lack of sure setting and settling my mind in God, where it should be.  And when I mend that fault of mine, I shall soon ease my grief.

Now, as for all the other griefs and pains that are in captivity, thraldom, and bondage, I cannot deny that many there are and great.  Howbeit, they seem yet somewhat the more—­what say I, “somewhat”?  I may say a great deal the more—­because we took our former liberty for a great deal more than indeed it was.

Let us therefore consider the matter thus:  Captivity, bondage, or thraldom, what is it but the violent restraint of a man, being so subdued under the dominion, rule, and power of another that he must do whatever the other please to command him, and may not do at his liberty such things as he please himself?  Now, when we shall be carried away by a Turk and be fain to be occupied about such things as he please to set us, we shall lament the loss of our liberty and think we bear a heavy burden of our servile condition.  And we shall have, I grant well, many times great occasion to do so.  But yet we should, I suppose, set somewhat the less by it, if we would remember well what liberty that was that we lost, and take it for no larger than it was indeed.  For we reckon as though we might before do what we would, but in that we deceive ourselves.  For what free man is there so free that he can be suffered to do what he please?  In many things God hath restrained us by his high commandment—­so many, that of those things which we would otherwise do, I daresay it be more than half.  Howbeit, because (God forgive