They rode side by side in silence. Ere either spoke again they were on the other side of Rushedge. Briarfield lights starred the purple skirt of the moor. Robert, being the youngest, and having less of the past to absorb him than his comrade, recommenced first.
"I believe--I daily find it proved--that we can get nothing in this world worth keeping, not so much as a principle or a conviction, except out of purifying flame or through strengthening peril. We err, we fall, we are humbled; then we walk more carefully. We greedily eat and drink poison out of the gilded cup of vice or from the beggar's wallet of avarice. We are sickened, degraded; everything good in us rebels against us; our souls rise bitterly indignant against our bodies; there is a period of civil war; if the soul has strength, it conquers and rules thereafter."
"What art thou going to do now, Robert? What are thy plans?"

They rode side by side in silence. Before either spoke again they were on the other side of Rushedge. Briarfield's lights starred the purple skirt of the moor. Robert recommenced first.
"I believe that we can get nothing in this world worth keeping, except through struggle or peril. We err, we fall, we are humbled; then we walk more carefully. If the soul has strength, it conquers and rules thereafter."
"What art thou going to do now, Robert? What are thy plans?"
