confesses that, as a matter of fact, his presence would only make things
worse for Everyman, for love of riches is a sin. Finally Everyman seeks
out poor forgotten Good-Deeds, only to find her bound fast by his sins.
In this strait he turns to Knowledge, and under her guidance visits
Confession, who prescribes a penance of self-chastisement. The
administration of this has so liberating an effect on Good-Deeds that
she is able to rise and join Everyman and Knowledge. To them are
summoned Discretion, Strength, Beauty and Five-Wits--friends of
Everyman--and all journey together until, as they draw near the end, the
last four depart. At the grave Knowledge stays outside, but Good-Deeds
enters with Everyman, whose welcome to Heaven is announced directly
afterwards by an angel. The epilogue, spoken by a Doctor, supplies a
pious interpretation of the play.

Such are the stories of the two best known Moralities. From them we can
judge how great a change had come over the drama. Nowhere is there any
incident approaching the nature of 'The Sacrifice of Isaac', nowhere is
there any character worthy to stand beside the Mary of the Miracle Play.
Those are the losses. On the other hand, we perceive a new
compactness--still loose, but much in advance of what existed
before--whereby the central figure is always before us, urged along from
one act and one set of surroundings to another, towards a goal which is
never lost sight of. Also there is the invention which provides for
these two plays different plots, as well as some diversity of
characters. The superiority of the shorter play--_Everyman_ contains
just over nine hundred lines--to the older one is less readily detected
in a comparison of bare plots, though it becomes obvious as soon as one
reads the plays. It lies in a more detailed characterization, in a
deliberate attempt to humanize the abstractions, in the substitution of
something like real conversation for the orderly succession of debating