son: "What thou sayest about main roads is true.[1] For on a certain
day when my companions and I wished to arrive in the city
by sunset and were still a long way from it, we saw a footpath
which it seemed would shorten the journey. But we met an old
man and inquired of him about the course of that path. The old
man said: "The footpath leads more direct to the city than the highway
and yet you will arrive there more quickly by the highway.'
When we heard this we considered him a fool, and letting him
proceed along the highway, we turned into the bypath. Pursuing
this path now to the right and now to the left, we wandered about
until it was night and did not reach the city. But if we had followed
the main road we would no doubt have entered the walls of
the city." The father replied to this:[2] "It happened to us differently
as we were following the highway to the city; there was a
river before us which we had to cross by some means before we
could enter the city. And so, as we were proceeding on the journey
we found the road divided, one fork of Which led to the city
through a ford, the other by a bridge. And then we saw an old
man, of whom we inquired which of the two ways would bring us
more quickly into the city. And the old man said the road by the
ford was shorter by two miles than the road over the bridge. 'But,
nevertheless,' he said, 'you will arrive in the city more quickly by
the bridge,' And some of our party made fun of the old man,
as certain of yours before did, and took the way across the
ford. And some of them had their companions swept down by the
current, others lost their horses and baggage, some had their clothes
soaked with water, and others wept because their clothes were lost
entirely. But we and our old man who crossed by the bridge proceeded
without hindrance and any inconvenience and found them
again, lamenting their losses on the bank of the river. To whom
thus weeping and searching the depths of the river with rakes and
nets the old man said: 'If you had gone with us across the bridge,
you would not have had this delay.' But they replied: 'We did this
because we did not wish to be delayed on the way.' And the old
man answered to this: 'Now you are still more delayed.' Then we
left them behind and joyfully entered the gates of the city. I once
heard this proverb: 'The long road to heaven is preferable to the
short road to hell'."
The fader saide to the sone:[3] "If thow be in the wey with any felaw, love thow hym as thisilf and thynk nat in any wise to disceive hym lest he disceive the, as ii Burgeis and a Cherl happed to felawship." Quod the sone: "Fader, tel me that as sum profite therof may be taken herafter." The fader saide:
