J. R. R. Tolkien describes one of his characters in The Lord of the Rings, Sam Gamgee, who has a similar trial of faith and comes through it. But even as hope died in Sam, or seemed to die, it was turned to a new strength . . . and he felt through all his limbs a thrill, as if he was turning into some creature of stone and steel that neither despair nor weariness nor endless barren miles could subdue.
