He must see whether he be lightsome, glad, and joyful or
dumpish, heavy, and sad, and whether he go about it as one that
were full of the glad hope of heaven, or as one who had his breast
stuffed full of tediousness and weariness of the world. If he were
found to be of the first fashion, it would be a token that the
devil had, by his fantastical apparitions, puffed him up in such a
childish pride that he hath finally persuaded him, by some
illusion showed him for the proof, that God's pleasure is that he
shall for his sake with his own hands kill himself.
VINCENT: Now, if a man so found it, uncle, what counsel should he
give him then?
ANTHONY: That would be somewhat out of our purpose, cousin, since
(as I told you before) the man would not be in sorrow and
tribulation, of which our matter speaketh, but in a perilous merry
mortal temptation. So that if we should, beside our matter that we
have in hand, enter into that too, we might make a longer work
between both than we could well finish this day. Howbeit, to be
short, it is soon seen that in such a case the sum and effect of
the counsel must (in a manner) rest in giving him warning of the
devil's sleights. And that must be done under such a sweet
pleasant manner that the man should not abhor to hear it.
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