For you have shut me from the privilege.

_Grace_.

I asked it once; you gave me unbelief.
I had no choice but to grow hard again.
'Tis my misfortune and my misery
That every hand whose friendly ministry
My poor heart craves, is held--withheld--by him;
And I must freeze that I may stand alone.

_Mary_.

And so, because one man is false, or you
Imagine him to be, all men are false;
Do I speak rightly?

_Grace_.

Have it your own way.
Men fit to love, and fitted to be loved,
Are prone to falsehood. I will not gainsay
The common virtue of the common herd.
I prize it as I do the goodish men
Who hold the goodish stuff, and know it not.
These serve to fill an easy-going world,
And that to clothe it with complacency.

_Mary_.