Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 2.djvu/49

Rh mother, do you afflict yourself in this manner?" "Oh, my son!" returned she, "I have much reason to weep. Above our heads is an intercourse with mankind; and there the sun shines in his splendour. Here, we are kept in utter darkness, and light never blesses our sight." "I am ignorant of all this," said the boy, "because I was born in prison. As long as I receive a sufficiency of meat and drink, I shall willingly remain here." As they thus conversed, the emperor and his guards were passing the place of their confinement. One of them solicited his sovereign to liberate the mother and son; and he, compassionating their distress, and in consideration of the entreaties of his attendants, set them at liberty, and absolved them from future punishment.

My beloved, the emperor is our heavenly Father: the wife, is the soul; and the husband, is Christ. The prison is hell. The child