Who is it?
(Not looking up).
JOHN ENDICOTT.
It is I.
ENDICOTT (restraining himself).
Sit down! JOHN ENDICOTT (sitting down).
I come to intercede for these poor people Who are in prison, and await their trial.
ENDICOTT.
It is of them I wished to speak with you.
I have been angry with you, but 't is passed.
For when I hear your footsteps come or go, See in your features your dead mother's face, And in your voice detect some tone of hers, All anger vanishes, and I remember The days that are no more, and come no more, When as a child you sat upon my knee, And prattled of your playthings, and the games You played among the pear trees in the orchard! JOHN ENDICOTT.
Oh, let the memory of my noble mother Plead with you to be mild and merciful! For mercy more becomes a Magistrate Than the vindictive wrath which men call justice! ENDICOTT.
The sin of heresy is a deadly sin.
'T is like the falling of the snow, whose crystals The traveller plays with, thoughtless of his danger, Until he sees the air so full of light That it is dark; and blindly staggering onward, Lost and bewildered, he sits down to rest; There falls a pleasant drowsiness upon him, And what he thinks is sleep, alas! is death.
JOHN ENDICOTT.
And yet who is there that has never doubted?
And doubting and believing, has not said, "Lord, I believe; help thou my unbelief"?
ENDICOTT.
In the same way we trifle with our doubts, Whose shining shapes are like the stars descending; Until at last, bewildered and dismayed, Blinded by that which seemed to give us light, We sink to sleep, and find that it is death, Rising.
Death to the soul through all eternity! Alas that I should see you growing up To man's estate, and in the admonition And nurture of the law, to find you now Pleading for Heretics! JOHN ENDICOTT (rising).
In the sight of God, Perhaps all men are Heretics.

Who dares To say that he alone has found the truth?
We cannot always feel and think and act As those who go before us.

Had you done so, You would not now be here.
ENDICOTT.
Have you forgotten The doom of Heretics, and the fate of those Who aid and comfort them?
Have you forgotten That in the market-place this very day You trampled on the laws?
What right have you, An inexperienced and untravelled youth, To sit in judgment here upon the acts Of older men and wiser than yourself, Thus stirring up sedition in the streets, And making me a byword and a jest?
JOHN ENDICOTT.
Words of an inexperienced youth like me Were powerless if the acts of older men Were not before them.

'T is these laws themselves Stir up sedition, not my judgment of them.
ENDICOTT.
Take heed, lest I be called, as Brutus was, To be the judge of my own son.

Begone! When you are tired of feeding upon husks, Return again to duty and submission, But not till then.
JOHN ENDICOTT.
I hear and I obey! [Exit.
ENDICOTT.
Oh happy, happy they who have no children! He's gone! I hear the hall door shut behind him.
It sends a dismal echo through my heart, As if forever it had closed between us, And I should look upon his face no more! Oh, this will drag me down into my grave,-- To that eternal resting-place wherein Man lieth down, and riseth not again! Till the heavens be no more, he shall not wake, Nor be roused from his sleep; for Thou dost change His countenance and sendest him away! [Exit.
ACT III.
SCENE I.-- The Court of Assistants, ENDICOTT, BELLINGHAM, ATHERTON, and other magistrates.