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140
HISTORY OF THE ROSICRUCIANS.
she might give him satisfaction, when the husband's
integrity so mightily
affected the noble man that he
thought it a sin to touch so honest a wife, and sent her
home with honour to her lord. The little man, perceiving
such faith in all these, would not, how poor soever he were,
be the least, but restored the noble man all his goods, and
went his way. Now, my lords,
"
which of these persons
showed the greatest ingenuity ?
Here our tongues were
quite cut off, neither would the Virgin make any reply but
that another should go on ; wherefore the fifth began :
"I desire not to make long work. Who hath the greater
joy, he that beholdeth what he loveth, or he that only
thinketh on it 1 " " He that beholdeth it," said the Virgin.
" Nay," answered I, and hereupon rose a contest till the
sixth called out :
" My lords, I am to take a wife ; I have
before me a maid, a married wife, and a widdow ;
of this doubt, and I will help to order the rest."
ease me
"
It goes
well there," replied the seventh, "when a man hath his
choice, but with me the case is otherwise. In my youth I
loved a fair and virtuous virgin, and she me in like
manner ;
howbeit, because of her friends' denyal, we could
not come together in wedlock, whereupon she was married
to another, who maintained her honourably and with
affection, till she came into the pains of childbirth, which
went so hard with her that all thought she was dead, so
with much state and mourning she was interred. Now, I
thought with myself, during
her life thou couldst have no
part in this woman, but dead as she is, thou mayst
embrace her sufficiently, whereupon I took my servant
with me, who dug her up by night.
coffin and locked her in my arms,
Having opened the
I found some little
motion in her heart, which increased from my warmth, till