laws: Whether you will ever attain to _that_ house, will depend on the
manner in which you defend yourselves in _this_. A stout vigilance for
a short time will secure your certain happiness for ever. But every
thing depends on your present exertions. Don't complain and take
advantage of my absence, and call me a hard master, and grumble that
you are placed in the midst of a howling wilderness, without peace or
security. Say not, that you are exposed to temptations without any
power to resist them. You have some difficulties, it is true; but you
have many helps and many comforts to make this house tolerable, even
before you get to the other. Yours is not a hard service; and if it
were, 'the time is short.' You have arms if you will use them, and
doors if you will bar them, and strength if you will use it. I would
defy all the attacks of the robbers without, if I could depend on the
fidelity of the people within. If the thieves ever get in and destroy
the house, it must be by the connivance of one of the family. _For it
is a standing law of this castle, that mere outward attack can never
destroy it, if there be no traitor within._ You will stand or fall as
you observe this rule. If you are finally happy, it will be by my
grace and favor; if you are ruined, it will be your own fault."

"When the gentleman had done speaking, every servant repeated his
assurance of attachment and firm allegiance to his master. But among
them all, not one was so vehement and loud in his professions as old
Parley the porter. Parley, indeed, it was well known, was always
talking, which exposed him to no small danger; for as he was the
foremost to promise, so he was the slackest to perform. And, to speak
the truth, though he was a civil-spoken fellow, his master was more
afraid of him, with all his professions, than he was of the rest, who
protested less. He knew that Parley was vain, credulous, and
self-sufficient; and he always apprehended more danger from Parley's