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diff --git a/1886.txt b/1886.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..49fa016 --- /dev/null +++ b/1886.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7643 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Bunyan Characters (Second Series), by +Alexander Whyte + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Bunyan Characters (Second Series) + + +Author: Alexander Whyte + +Release Date: April 13, 2005 [eBook #1886] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BUNYAN CHARACTERS (SECOND SERIES)*** + + + + + + +Transcribed from the 1894 Oliphant Anderson and Ferrier edition by David +Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +BUNYAN CHARACTERS--SECOND SERIES +Lectures delivered in St. George's Free Church Edinburgh +By Alexander Whyte, D.D. + + +IGNORANCE + + + "I was alive without the law once."--_Paul_. + + "I was now a brisk talker also myself in the matter of + religion."--_Bunyan_. + +This is a new kind of pilgrim. There are not many pilgrims like this +bright brisk youth. A few more young gentlemen like this, and the +pilgrimage way would positively soon become fashionable and popular, and +be the thing to do. Had you met with this young gentleman in society, +had you noticed him beginning to come about your church, you would have +lost no time in finding out who he was. I can well believe it, you would +have replied. Indeed, I felt sure of it. I must ask him to the house. I +was quite struck with his appearance and his manners. Yes; ask him at +once to your house; show him some pointed attentions and you will never +regret it. For if he goes to the bar and works even decently at his +cases, he will be first a sheriff and then a judge in no time. If he +should take to politics, he will be an under-secretary before his first +parliament is out. And if he takes to the church, which is not at all +unlikely, our West-end congregations will all be competing for him as +their junior colleague; and, if he elects either of our Established +churches to exercise his profession in it, he will have dined with Her +Majesty while half of his class-fellows are still half-starved +probationers. Society fathers will point him out with anger to their +unsuccessful sons, and society mothers will smile under their eyelids as +they see him hanging over their daughters. + +Well, as this handsome and well-appointed youth stepped out of his own +neat little lane into the rough road on which our two pilgrims were +staggering upward, he felt somewhat ashamed to be seen in their company. +And I do not wonder. For a greater contrast you would not have seen on +any road in all that country that day. He was at your very first sight +of him a gentleman and the son of a gentleman. A little over-dressed +perhaps; as, also, a little lofty to the two rather battered but +otherwise decent enough men who, being so much older than he, took the +liberty of first accosting him. "Brisk" is his biographer's description +of him. Feather-headed, flippant, and almost impudent, you might have +been tempted to say of him had you joined the little party at that +moment. But those two tumbled, broken-winded, and, indeed, +broken-hearted old men had been, as an old author says, so emptied from +vessel to vessel--they had had a life of such sloughs and stiff +climbs--they had been in hunger and thirst, in cold and nakedness so +often--that it was no wonder that their dandiacal companion walked on a +little ahead of them. 'Gentlemen,' his fine clothes and his cane and his +head in the air all said to his two somewhat disreputable-looking fellow- +travellers,--"Gentlemen, you be utter strangers to me: I know you not. +And, besides, I take my pleasure in walking alone, even more a great deal +than in company, unless I like it better." But all his society manners, +and all his costly and well-kept clothes, and all his easy and +self-confident airs did not impose upon the two wary old pilgrims. They +had seen too much of the world, and had been too long mixing among all +kinds of pilgrims, young and old, true and false, to be easily imposed +upon. Besides, as one could see from their weather-beaten faces, and +their threadbare garments, they had found the upward way so dreadfully +difficult that they both felt a real apprehension as to the future of +this light-hearted and light-headed youth. "You may find some difficulty +at the gate," somewhat bluntly broke in the oldest of the two pilgrims on +their young comrade. "I shall, no doubt, do at the gate as other good +people do," replied the young gentleman briskly. "But what have you to +show at the gate that may cause that the gate be opened to you?" "Why, I +know my Lord's will, and I have been a good liver all my days, and I pay +every man his own. I pray, moreover, and I fast. I pay tithes, and give +alms, and have left my country for whither I am going." Now, before we +go further: Do all you young gentlemen do as much as that? Have you +always been good livers? Have you paid every man and woman their due? Do +you pray to be called prayer? And, if so, when, and where, and what for, +and how long at a time? I do not ask if your private prayer-book is like +Bishop Andrewes' _Devotions_, which was so reduced to pulp with tears and +sweat and the clenching of his agonising hands that his literary +executors were with difficulty able to decipher it. Clito in the +_Christian Perfection_ was so expeditious with his prayers that he used +to boast that he could both dress and do his devotions in a quarter of an +hour. What was the longest time you ever took to dress or undress and +say your prayers? Then, again, there is another Anglican young gentleman +in the same High Church book who always fasts on Good Friday and the +Thirtieth of January. Did you ever deny yourself a glass of wine or a +cigar or an opera ticket for the church or the poor? Could you honestly +say that you know what tithes are? And is there a poor man or woman or +child in this whole city who will by any chance put your name into their +prayers and praises at bedtime to-night? I am afraid there are not many +young gentlemen in this house to-night who could cast a stone at that +brisk lad Ignorance, Vain-Hope, door in the side of the hill, and all. He +was not far from the kingdom of heaven; indeed, he got up to the very +gate of it. How many of you will get half as far? + +Now (what think you?), was it not a very bold thing in John Bunyan, whose +own descent was of such a low and inconsiderable generation, his father's +house being of that rank that is meanest and most despised of all the +families in the land--was it not almost too bold in such a clown to take +such a gentleman-scholar as Saul of Tarsus, the future Apostle of the +Lord, and put him into the _Pilgrim's Progress_, and there go on to +describe him as a very brisk lad and nickname him with the nickname of +Ignorance? For, in knowledge of all kinds to be called knowledge, +Gamaliel's gold medallist could have bought the unlettered tinker of +Elstow in one end of the market and sold him in the other. And nobody +knew that better than Bunyan did. And yet such a lion was he for the +truth, such a disciple of Luther was he, and such a defender and preacher +of the one doctrine of a standing or falling church, that he fills page +after page with the crass ignorance of the otherwise most learned of all +the New Testament men. Bunyan does not accuse the rising hope of the +Pharisees of school or of synagogue ignorance. That young Hebrew Rabbi +knew every jot and tittle of the law of Moses, and all the accumulated +traditions of the fathers to boot. But Bunyan has Paul himself with him +when he accuses and convicts Saul of an absolutely brutish ignorance of +his own heart and hidden nature. That so very brisk lad was always +boasting in himself of the day on which he was circumcised, and of the +old stock of which he had come; of his tribe, of his zeal, of his +blamelessness, and of the profit he had made of his educational and +ecclesiastical opportunities. Whereas Bunyan is fain to say of himself +in his _Grace Abounding_ that he is "not able to boast of noble blood or +of a high-born state according to the flesh. Though, all things +considered, I magnify the Heavenly Majesty for that by this door He +brought me into this world to partake of the grace and life that is in +Christ by the Gospel." + +As we listen to the conversation that goes on between the two old +pilgrims and this smartly appointed youth, we find them striving hard, +but without any sign of success, to convince him of some of the things +from which he gets his somewhat severe name. For one thing, they at last +bluntly told him that he evidently did not know the very A B C about +himself. Till, when too hard pressed by the more ruthless of the two old +men, the exasperated youth at last frankly burst out: "I will never +believe that my heart is thus bad!" There is a warm touch of Bunyan's +own experience here, mixed up with his so dramatic development of Paul's +morsels of autobiography that he lets drop in his Epistles to the +Philippians and to the Galatians. "Now was I become godly; now I was +become a right honest man. Though as yet I was nothing but a poor +painted hypocrite, yet I was proud of my godliness. I read my Bible, but +as for Paul's Epistles, and such like Scriptures, I could not away with +them; being, as yet, but ignorant both of the corruptions of my nature +and of the want and worth of Jesus Christ to save me. The new birth did +never enter my mind, neither knew I the deceitfulness and treachery of my +own wicked heart. And as for secret thoughts, I took no notice of them." +My brethren, old and young, what do you think of all that? What have you +to say to all that? Does all that not open a window and let a flood of +daylight into your own breast? I am sure it does. That is the best +portrait of you that ever was painted. Do you not see yourself there as +in a glass? And do you not turn with disgust and loathing from the +stupid and foolish face? You complain and tell stories about how +impostors and cheats and liars have come to your door and have impudently +thrust themselves into your innermost rooms; but your own heart, if you +only knew it, is deceitful far above them all. Not the human heart as it +stands in confessions, and in catechisms, and in deep religious books, +but your own heart that beats out its blood-poison of self-deceit, and +darkness, and death day and night continually. "My heart is a good +heart," said that poor ill-brought-up boy, who was already destroyed by +his father and his mother for lack of self-knowledge. I entirely grant +you that those two old sinners by this time were taking very pessimistic +and very melancholy views of human nature, and, therefore, of every human +being, young and old. They knew that no language had ever been coined in +any scripture, or creed, or catechism, or secret diary of the deepest +penitent, that even half uttered their own evil hearts; and they had +lived long enough to see that we are all cut out of one web, are all dyed +in one vat, and are all corrupted beyond all accusation or confession in +Adam's corruption. But how was that poor, mishandled lad to know or +believe all that? He could not. It was impossible. "You go so fast, +gentlemen, that I cannot keep pace with you. Go you on before and I will +stay a while behind." Then said Christian to his companion: "It pities +me much for this poor lad, for it will certainly go ill with him at +last." "Alas!" said Hopeful, "there are abundance in our town in his +condition: whole families, yea, whole streets, and that of pilgrims too." +Is your family such a family as this? And are you yourself just such a +pilgrim as Ignorance was, and are you hastening on to just such an end? + +And then, as a consequence, being wholly ignorant of his own corruption +and condemnation in the sight of God, this miserable man must remain +ignorant and outside of all that God has done in Christ for corrupt and +condemned men. "I believe that Christ died for sinners and that I shall +be justified before God from the curse through His gracious acceptance of +my obedience to His law. Or, then, to take it this way, Christ makes my +duties that are religious acceptable to His Father by virtue of His +merits, and so shall I be justified." Now, I verify believe that nine +out of ten of the young men who are here to-night would subscribe that +statement and never suspect there was anything wrong with it or with +themselves. And yet, what does Christian, who, in this matter, is just +John Bunyan, who again is just the word of God--what does the old pilgrim +say to this confession of this young pilgrim's faith? "Ignorance is thy +name," he says, "and as thy name is, so art thou: even this thy answer +demonstrateth what I say. Ignorant thou art of what justifying +righteousness is, and as ignorant how to secure thy soul through the +faith of it from the heavy wrath of God. Yea, thou also art ignorant of +the true effect of saving faith in this righteousness of Christ's, which +is to bow and win over the heart to God in Christ, to love His name, His +word, His ways, and His people." Paul sums up all his own early life in +this one word, "ignorant of God's righteousness." "Going about," he says +also, "to establish our own righteousness, not submitting ourselves to be +justified by the righteousness that God has provided with such wisdom and +grace, and at such a cost in His Son Jesus Christ." Now, young men, I +defy you to be better born, better brought up, or to have better +prospects than Saul of Tarsus had. I defy you to have profited more by +all your opportunities and advantages than he had done. I defy you to be +more blameless in your opening manhood than he was. And yet it all went +like smoke when he got a true sight of himself, and, with that, a true +sight of Christ and His justifying righteousness. Read at home to-night, +and read when alone, what that great man of God says about all that in +his classical epistle to the Philippians, and refuse to sleep till you +have made the same submission. And, to-night, and all your days, let +_submission_, Paul's splendid submission, be the soul and spirit of all +your religious life. Submission to be searched by God's holy law as by a +lighted candle: submission to be justified from all that that candle +discovers: submission to take Christ as your life and righteousness, +sanctification and redemption: and submission of your mind and your will +and your heart to Him at all times and in all things. Nay, stay still, +and say where you sit, Lord, I submit. I submit on the spot to be +pardoned. I submit now to be saved. I submit in all things from this +very hour and house of God not any longer to be mine own, but to be +Thine, O God, Thine, Thine, for ever, in Jesus Christ Thy Son and my +Saviour! + +"But, one day, as I was passing in the field, and that, too, with some +dashes in my conscience, fearing lest all was not right, suddenly this +sentence fell upon my soul, Thy Righteousness is in heaven! And, +methought, I saw with the eyes of my soul Jesus Christ at God's right +hand. There, I saw, was my Righteousness. I also saw, moreover, that it +was not my good frame of heart that made my Righteousness better, nor my +bad frame of heart that made my Righteousness worse: for my Righteousness +was Jesus Christ Himself, the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever. +'Twas glorious to me to see His exaltation, and the worth and prevalency +of His benefits. And that because I could now look from myself to Him +and should reckon that all those graces of God that were now green in me +were yet but like those crack-groats and four-pence halfpennies that rich +men carry in their purses when their gold is in their trunks at home! Oh, +I saw that day that my gold was all in my trunk at home! Even in Christ, +my Lord and Saviour! Now, Christ was all to me: all my wisdom, all my +righteousness, all my sanctification and all my redemption." + + "Methinks in this God speaks, + No tinker hath such power." + + + + +LITTLE-FAITH + + + "O thou of little faith."--_Our Lord_. + +Little-Faith, let it never be forgotten, was, all the time, a good man. +With all his mistakes about himself, with his sad misadventure, with all +his loss of blood and of money, and with his whole after-lifetime of +doleful and bitter complaints,--all the time, Little-Faith was all +through, in a way, a good man. To keep us right on this all-important +point, and to prevent our being prematurely prejudiced against this +pilgrim because of his somewhat prejudicial name--because give a dog a +bad name, you know, and you had better hang him out of hand at +once--because, I say, of this pilgrim's somewhat suspicious name, his +scrupulously just, and, indeed, kindly affected biographer says of him, +and says it of him not once nor twice, but over and over and over again, +that this Little-Faith was really all the time a truly good man. And, +more than that, this good man's goodness was not a new thing with him it +was not a thing of yesterday. This man had, happily to begin with, a +good father and a good mother. And if there was a good town in all those +parts for a boy to be born and brought up in it was surely the town of +Sincere. "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old +he will not depart from it." Well, Little-Faith had been so trained up +both by his father and his mother and his schoolmaster and his minister, +and he never cost either of them a sore heart or even an hour's sleep. +One who knew him well, as well, indeed, as only one young man knows +another, has been fain to testify, when suspicions have been cast on the +purity and integrity of his youth, that nothing will describe this +pilgrim so well in the days of his youth as just those beautiful words +out of the New Testament--"an example to all young men in word, in +conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith even, and in purity"--and +that, if there was one young man in all that town of Sincere who kept his +garments unspotted it was just our pilgrim of to-night. Yes, said one +who had known him all his days, if the child is the father of the man, +then Little-Faith, as you so unaccountably to me call him, must have been +all along a good man. + +It was said long ago in _Vanity Fair_ about our present Premier that if +he were a worse man he would be a better statesman. Now, I do not repeat +that in this place because I agree with it, but because it helps to +illustrate, as sometimes a violent paradox will help to illustrate, a +truth that does not lie all at once on the surface. But it is no paradox +or extravagance or anything but the simple truth to say that if Little- +Faith had had more and earlier discoveries made to him of the innate evil +of his own heart, even if it had been by that innate evil bursting out of +his heart and laying waste his good life, he would either have been +driven out of his little faith altogether or driven into a far deeper +faith. Had the commandment come to him in the manner it came to Paul; +had it come so as that the sinfulness of his inward nature had revived, +as Paul says, under its entrance; then, either his great goodness or his +little faith must have there and then died. God's truth and man's +goodness cannot dwell together in the same heart. Either the truth will +kill the goodness, or the goodness will kill the truth. Little-Faith, in +short, was such a good man, and had always been such a good man, and had +led such an easy life in consequence, that his faith had not been much +exercised, and therefore had not grown, as it must have been exercised +and must have grown, had he not been such a good man. In short, and to +put it bluntly, had Little-Faith been a worse sinner, he would have been +a better saint. "_O felix culpa_!" exclaimed a church father; "O happy +fault, which found for us sinners such a Redeemer." An apostrophe which +Bishop Ken has put into these four bold lines-- + + "What Adam did amiss, + Turned to our endless bliss; + O happy sin, which to atone, + Drew Filial God to leave His throne." + +And John Calvin, the soberest of men, supports Augustine, the most +impulsive of men, in saying the same thing. All things which happen to +the saints are so overruled by God that what the world regards as evil +the issue shows to be good. For what Augustine says is true, that even +the sins of saints are, through the guiding providence of God, so far +from doing harm to them, that, on the contrary, they serve to advance +their salvation. And Richard Hooker, a theologian, if possible, still +more judicious than even John Calvin, says on this same subject and in +support of the same great father, "I am not afraid to affirm it boldly +with St. Augustine that men puffed up through a proud opinion of their +own sanctity and holiness receive a benefit at the hands of God, and are +assisted with His grace, when with His grace they are not assisted, but +permitted, and that grievously, to transgress. Ask the very soul of +Peter, and it shall undoubtedly make you itself this answer: My eager +protestations, made in the glory of my ghostly strength, I am ashamed of; +but those crystal tears, wherewith my sin and weakness were bewailed, +have procured my endless joy: my strength hath been my ruin, and my fall +my stay." And our own Samuel Rutherford is not likely to be left far +behind by the best of them when the grace of God is to be magnified. "Had +sin never been we should have wanted the mysterious Emmanuel, the +Beloved, the Chief among ten thousand, Christ, God-man, the Saviour of +sinners. For, no sick sinners, no soul-physician of sinners; no captive, +no Redeemer; no slave of hell, no lovely ransom-payer of heaven. Mary +Magdalene with her seven devils, Paul with his hands smoking with the +blood of the saints, and with his heart sick with malice and blasphemy +against Christ and His Church, and all the rest of the washen ones whose +robes are made fair in the blood of the Lamb, and all the multitude that +no man can number in that best of lands, are all but bits of free grace. +O what a depth of unsearchable wisdom to contrive that lovely plot of +free grace. Come, all intellectual capacities, and warm your hearts at +this fire. Come, all ye created faculties, and smell the precious +ointment of Christ. Oh come, sit down under His shadow and eat the +apples of life. Oh that angels would come, and generations of men, and +wonder, and admire, and fall down before the unsearchable wisdom of this +gospel-art of the unsearchable riches of Christ!" And always pungent +Thomas Shepard of New England: "You shall find this, that there is not +any carriage or passage of the Lord's providence toward thee but He will +get a name to Himself, first and last, by it. Hence you shall find that +those very sins that dishonour His name He will even by them get Himself +a better name; for so far will they be from casting you out of His love +that He will actually do thee good by them. Look and see if it is not so +with thee? Doth not thy weakness strengthen thee like Paul? Doth not +thy blindness make thee cry for light? And hath not God out of darkness +oftentimes brought light? Thou hast felt venom against Christ and thy +brother, and thou hast on that account loathed thyself the more. Thy +falls into sin make thee weary of it, watchful against it, long to be rid +of it. And thus He makes thy poison thy food, thy death thy life, thy +damnation thy salvation, and thy very greatest enemies thy very best +friends. And hence Mr. Fox said that he thanked God more for his sins +than for his good works. And the reason is, God will have His name." +And, last, but not least, listen to our old acquaintance, James Fraser of +Brea: "I find advantages by my sins: '_Peccare nocet, peccavisse vero +juvat_.' I may say, as Mr. Fox said, my sins have, in a manner, done me +more good than my graces. Grace and mercy have more abounded where sin +had much abounded. I am by my sins made much more humble, watchful, +revengeful against myself. I am made to see a greater need to depend +more upon Him and to love Him the more. I find that true which Shepard +says, 'sin loses strength by every new fall.'" Have you followed all +that, my brethren? Or have you stumbled at it? Do you not understand +it? Does your superficial gin-horse mind incline to shake its empty head +over all this? I know that great names, and especially the great names +of your own party, go much farther with you than the truth goes, and +therefore I have sheltered this deep truth under a shield of great names. +For their sakes let this sure truth of God's best saints lie in peace and +undisputed beside you till you arrive to understand it. + +But, to proceed,--the thing was this. At this passage there comes down +from Broadway-gate a lane called Dead-Man's-lane, so called because of +the murders that are commonly done there. And this Little-Faith going on +pilgrimage, as we now do, chanced to sit down there and fell fast asleep. +Yes; the thing was this: This good man had never been what one would call +really awake. He was not a bad man, as men went in the town of Sincere, +but he always had a half-slept half-awakened look about his eyes, till +now, at this most unfortunate spot, he fell stone-dead asleep. You all +know, I shall suppose, what the apostle Paul and John Bunyan mean by +sleep, do you not? You all know, at any rate, to begin with, what sleep +means in the accident column of the morning papers. You all know what +sleep meant and what it involved and cost in the Thirsk signal-box the +other night. {1} When a man is asleep, he is as good as dead, and other +people are as good as dead to him. He is dead to duty, to danger, to +other people's lives, as well as to his own. He may be having pleasant +dreams, and may even be laughing aloud in his sleep, but that may only +make his awaking all the more hideous. He may awake just in time, or he +may awake just too late. Only, he is asleep and he neither knows nor +cares. Now, there is a sleep of the soul as well as of the body. And as +the soul is in worth, as the soul is in its life and in its death to the +body, so is its sleep. Many of you sitting there are quite as dead to +heaven and hell, to death and judgment, and to what a stake other people +as well as yourselves have in your sleep as that poor sleeper in the +signal-box was dead to what was coming rushing on him through the black +night. And as all his gnashing of teeth at himself, and all his sobs +before his judge and before the laid-out dead, and before distracted +widows and half-mad husbands did not bring back that fatal moment when he +fell asleep so sweetly, so will it be with you. Lazarus! come forth! +Wise and foolish virgins both: Behold the Bridegroom cometh! Awake, thou +that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light! + +And, with that, Guilt with a great club that was in his hand struck +Little-Faith on the head, and with that blow felled him to the earth, +where he lay bleeding as one that would soon bleed to death. Yes, yes, +all true to the very life. A man may be the boast and the example of all +the town, and yet, unknown to them all, and all but unknown to himself +till he is struck down, he may have had guilt enough on his track all the +time to lay him half dead at the mouth of Dead-Man's-lane. Good as was +the certificate that all men in their honesty gave to Little-Faith, yet +even he had some bad enough memories behind him and within him had he +only kept them ever present with him. But, then, it was just this that +all along was the matter with Little-Faith. Till, somehow, after that +sad and yet not wholly evil sleep, all his past sins leapt out into the +light and suddenly became and remained all the rest of his life like +scarlet. So loaded, indeed, was the club of Guilt with the nails and +studs and clamps of secret aggravation, that every nail and stud left its +own bleeding bruise in the prostrate man's head. I have myself, says the +narrator of Little-Faith's story, I have myself been engaged as he was, +and I found it to be a terrible thing. I would, as the saying is, have +sold my life at that moment for a penny; but that, as God would have it, +I was clothed with armour of proof: ay, and yet though I was thus +harnessed, I found it hard work to quit myself like a man. No man can +tell what in that combat attends us but he that hath been in the battle +himself. Great-Grace himself,--whoso looks well upon his face shall see +those cuts and scars that shall easily give demonstration of what I say. + +Most unfortunately there was no good Samaritan with his beast on the road +that day to take the half-dead man to an inn. And thus it was that +Little-Faith was left to lie in his blood till there was almost no more +blood left in him. Till at last, coming a little to himself, he made a +shift to scrabble on his way. When he was able to look a little to +himself, besides all his wounds and loss of blood, he found that all his +spending money was gone, and what was he to do, a stranger in such a +plight on a strange road? There was nothing for it but he must just beg +his way with many a hungry belly for the remainder of his way. You all +understand the parable at this point? Our knowledge of gospel truth; our +personal experience of the life of God in our own soul; our sensible +attainments in this grace of the Spirit and in that; in secret prayer, in +love to God, in forgiveness of injuries, in goodwill to all men, and in +self-denial that no one knows of,--in things like these we possess what +may be called the pocket-money of the spiritual life. All these things, +at their best, are not the true jewel that no thief can break through nor +steal; but though they are not our best and truest riches, yet they have +their place and play their part in sending us up the pilgrim way. By our +long and close study of the word of God, if that is indeed our case; by +divine truth dwelling richly and experimentally in our hearts; and by a +hidden life that is its own witness, and which always has the Holy +Spirit's seal set upon it that we are the children of God,--all that +keeps, and is designed by God to keep our hearts up amid the labours and +the faintings, the hopes and the fears of the spiritual life. All that +keeps us at the least and the worst above famine and beggary. Now, the +whole pity with Little-Faith was, that though he was not a bad man, yet +he never, even at his best days, had much of those things that make a +good and well-furnished pilgrim; and what little he had he had now clean +lost. He had never been much a reader of his Bible; he had never sat +over it as other men sat over their news-letters and their romances. He +had never had much taste or talent for spiritual books of any kind. He +was a good sort of man, but he was not exactly the manner of man on whose +broken heart the Holy Ghost sets the broad seal of heaven. But for his +dreadful misadventure, he might have plodded on, a decent, humdrum, +commonplace, everyday kind of pilgrim; but when that catastrophe fell on +him he had nothing to fall back upon. The secret ways of faith and love +and hope were wholly unknown to him. He had no practice in importunate +prayer. He had never prayed a whole night all his life. He had never +needed to do so. For were we not told when we first met him what a +blameless and pure and true and good man he had always been? He did not +know how to find his way about in his Bible; and as for the maps and +guide-books that some pilgrims never let out of their hand, even when he +had some spending money about him, he never laid it out that way. And a +more helpless pilgrim than Little-Faith was all the rest of the way you +never saw. He was forced to beg as he went, says his historian. That is +to say, he had to lean upon and look to wiser and better-furnished men +than himself. He had to share their meals, look to them to pay his +bills, keep close to their company, walk in their foot-prints, and at +night borrow their oil, and it was only in this poor dependent way that +Little-Faith managed to struggle on to the end of his dim and joyless +journey. + +It would have been far more becoming and far more profitable if Christian +and Hopeful, instead of falling out of temper and calling one another bad +names over the sad case of Little-Faith, had tried to tell one another +why that unhappy pilgrim's faith was so small, and how both their own +faith and his might from that day have been made more. Hopeful, for some +reason or other, was in a rude and boastful mood of mind that day, and +Christian was more tart and snappish than we have ever before seen him; +and, altogether, the opportunity of learning something useful out of +Little-Faith's story has been all but lost to us. But, now, since there +are so many of Little-Faith's kindred among ourselves--so many good men +who are either half asleep in their religious life or are begging their +way from door to door--let them be told, in closing, one or two out of +many other ways in which their too little faith may possibly be made +stronger and more fruitful. + +Well, then, faith, like everything else, once we have it, grows greater +by our continual exercise of it. Exercise, then, intentionally and +seriously and on system your faith every day. And exercise it habitually +and increasingly on your Bible, on heaven, and on Jesus Christ. And let +your faith on all these things, and places, and persons, work by love,--by +love and by imagination. Our love is cold and our faith is small and +weak for lack of imagination. Read your Psalm, your Gospel, your Epistle +every morning and every night with your eye upon the object. Think you +see the Psalmist amid all his deep and divine experiences. Think you see +Jesus Christ speaking His parables, saying His prayers, and doing His +good works. Walk up and down with Him, observing His manner, His look, +His gait, His divinity in your humanity, till Galilee and Jerusalem +become Scotland and Edinburgh; that is, till He is as much with you, and +more, than He was with Peter and James and John. Never close your eye a +single night till you have again laid your hand on the very head of the +Lamb of God, and till you feel that your sin and guilt have all passed +off your hand and on upon His head. And never rise without, like William +Law, saluting the rising sun in the name of God, as if he had just been +created and sent up into your sky to let you see to serve God and your +neighbour for another day. And be often out of this world and up in +heaven. Beat all about you at building castles in the air; you have more +material and more reason. For is not faith the substance of things hoped +for, and the evidence of things not seen? Walk often in heaven's +friendly streets. Pass often into heaven's many mansions filled with +happy families. Imagine this unhappy life at an end, and imagine +yourself sent back to this probationary world to play the man for a few +short years before heaven finally calls you home. Little-Faith was a +good man, but there was no speculation in his eyes and no secrets of love +in his heart. And if your faith also is little, and your spending money +also is run low, try this way of love and imagination. If you have a +better way, then go on with it and be happy yourself and helpful to +others; but if your faith is at a standstill and is stricken with +barrenness, try my counsel of putting more heart and more inward eye, +more holy love and more heavenly joy, into your frigid and sterile +religion. + + + + +THE FLATTERER + + + "A man that flattereth his neighbour spreadeth a net for his + feet."--_The Wise Man_. + +Both Ignorance and Little-Faith would have had their revenge and +satisfaction upon Christian and Hopeful had they seen those two so +Pharisaical old men taken in the Flatterer's net. For it was nothing +else but the swaggering pride of Hopeful over the pitiful case of Little- +Faith, taken along with the hard and hasty ways of Christian with that +unhappy youth Ignorance, that so soon laid them both down under the small +cords of the Shining One. This word of the wise man, that pride goeth +before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall, was fulfilled to +the very letter in Christian and Hopeful that high-minded day. At the +same time, it must be admitted that Christian and Hopeful would have been +more than human if they had not both felt and let fall some superiority, +some scorn, and some impatience in the presence of such a silly and +upsetting stripling as Ignorance was; as, also, over the story of such a +poor-spirited and spunging creature as Little-Faith was. Christian and +Hopeful had just come down from their delightful time among the +Delectable Mountains, and they were as full as they could hold of all +kinds of knowledge, and faith, and hope, and assurance; when, most +unfortunately, as it turned out, they first came across Ignorance, and +then, after quarrelling with him, they fell out between themselves over +the case of Little-Faith. Their superior knowledge of the truth, and +their superior strength of faith, ought to have made them more able to +bear with the infirmities of the weak, and with the passing moods, +however provoking, of one another. But no. And their impatience and +contempt and bad temper all came at this crisis to such a head with them +that they could only be cured by the small cords and the stinging words +of the Shining One. The true key to this so painful part of the parable +hangs at our own girdle. We who have been born and brought up in an +evangelical church are thrown from time to time into the company of +men--ministers and people--who have not had our advantages and +opportunities. They have been born, baptized, and brought up in +communities and churches the clean opposite of ours; and they are as +ignorant of all New Testament religion as Ignorance himself was; or, on +the other hand, they are as full of superstition and terror and spiritual +starvation as Little-Faith was. And then, instead of recollecting and +laying to heart Who made us to differ from such ignorance and such +unbelief, and thus putting on love and humility and patience toward our +neighbours, we speak scornfully and roughly to them, and boast ourselves +over them, and as good as say to them, Stand by thyself, come not near to +me, for I am wiser, wider-minded, stronger, and better every way than +thou. And then, ere ever we are aware of what we are doing, we have let +the arch-flatterer of religious superiority and of spiritual pride seduce +us aside out of the lowly and heavenly way of love and humility till we +are again brought back to it with rebukes of conscience and with other +chastisements. You all understand, my brethren, that the man black of +flesh but covered with a white robe was no wayside seducer who met +Christian and Hopeful at that dangerous part of the road only and only on +that high-minded day. You know from yourselves surely that both +Christian and Hopeful carried that black but smooth-spoken man within +themselves. The Flatterer who led the two pilgrims so fatally wrong that +day was just their own heart taken out of their own bosom and personified +and dramatised by Bunyan's dramatic genius, and so made to walk and talk +and flatter and puff up outside of themselves till they came again to see +who in reality he was and whence he came,--that is to say, till they were +brought to see what they themselves still were, and would always be, when +they were left to themselves. "Where did you lie last night? asked the +Shining One with the whip. With the Shepherds on the Delectable +Mountains, they answered. He asked them then if they had not of those +shepherds a note of direction for the way? They answered, Yes. But did +you not, said he, when you were at a stand pluck out and read your note? +They answered, No. He asked them why? They said they forgot. He asked, +moreover if the shepherds did not bid them beware of the Flatterer? They +answered, Yes; but we did not imagine, said they, that this fine-spoken +man had been he." + +All good literature, both sacred and profane, both ancient and modern, is +full of the Flatterer. Let me not, protests Elihu in his powerful speech +in the book of Job, let me not accept any man's person; neither let me +give flattering titles unto man, lest in so doing my Maker should soon +take me away. And the Psalmist in his powerful description of the wicked +men of his day: There is no faithfulness in their mouth; their inward +part is very wickedness; their throat is an open sepulchre; they flatter +with their tongue. And again: They speak with flattering lips, and with +a double heart do they speak. But the Lord shall cut off all flattering +lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things. "The perpetual +hyperbole" of pure love becomes in the lips of impure love the impure +bait that leads the simple ones astray on the streets of the city as seen +and heard by the wise man out of his casement. My son, say unto wisdom, +Thou art my sister, and call understanding thy kinswoman; that they may +keep thee from the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth thee +with her words, which forsaketh the guide of her youth, and forgetteth +the covenant of her God. And then in the same book of Hebrew aphorisms +we find this text which Bunyan puts on the margin of the page: "A man +that flattereth his neighbour spreadeth a net for his feet." And now, +before we leave the ancient world, if you would not think it beneath the +dignity of the place we are in, I would like to read to you a passage out +of a round-about paper written by a satirist of Greece about the time of +Ezra and Nehemiah in Jerusalem. You will easily remark the difference of +tone between the seriousness and pathos of the Hebrew prophet and the +light and chaffing touch of Theophrastus. "The Flatterer is a person," +says that satirist of Greek society, "who will say to you as he walks +with you, 'Do you observe how people are looking at you? This happens to +no man in Athens but to you. A fine compliment was paid you yesterday in +the Porch. More than thirty persons were sitting there when the question +was started, Who is our foremost man? Every one mentioned you first, and +ended by coming back to your name.' The Flatterer will laugh also at +your stalest joke, and will stuff his cloak into his mouth as if he could +not repress his amusement when you again tell it. He will buy apples and +pears and will give to your children when you are by, and will kiss them +all and will say, 'Chicks of a good father.' Also, when he assists at +the purchase of slippers he will declare that the foot is more shapely +than the shoe. He is the first of the guests to praise the wine and to +say as he reclines next the host, 'How delicate your fare always is'; and +taking up something from the table, 'Now, how excellent that is!'" And +so on. Yes, we have heard it all over and over again in Modern Athens +also. The Greek fable also of the fox and the crow and the piece of +cheese is only another illustration of the truth that the God of truth +and integrity never left Himself without a witness. Our own literature +also is scattered full of the Flatterer and his too willing dupes. "Of +praise a mere glutton," says Goldsmith of David Garrick, "he swallowed +what came. The puff of a dunce he mistook it for fame." "Delicious +essence," exclaims Sterne, "how refreshing thou art to poor human nature! +How sweetly dost thou mix with the blood, and help it through the most +difficult and tortuous passages to the heart." "He that slanders me," +says Cowper, "paints me blacker than I am, and he that flatters me +whiter. They both daub me, and when I look in the glass of conscience, I +see myself disguised by both." And then he sings: + + "The worth of these three kingdoms I defy + To lure me to the baseness of a lie; + And of all lies (be that one poet's boast), + The lie that flatters I abhor the most." + +Now, praise, which is one of the best and sweetest things in human life, +so soon passes over into flattery, which is one of the worst things, that +something must here be said and laid to heart about praise also. But, to +begin with, praise itself must first be praised. There is nothing nobler +than true praise in him who speaks it, and there is nothing dearer and +sweeter to him who hears it. God Himself inhabits the praises of Israel. +All God's works praise Him. Whoso offereth praise glorifieth Me. Praise +waiteth for Thee, O God, in Zion. Enter into His gates with +thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise. Violence shall no more be +heard in thy land, wasting nor destruction within thy borders; but thou +shalt call thy walls Salvation, and thy gates Praise. And such also is +all true praise between man and man. How deliciously sweet is praise! +How we labour after it! how we look for it and wait for it! and how we +languish and die if we do not get it! Again, when it comes to us, how it +cheers us up and makes our face to shine! For a long time after it our +step is so swift on the street and our face beams so that all men can +quite well see what has come to us. Praise is like wine in our blood; it +is new life to our fainting heart. So much is this the case that a +salutation of praise is to be our first taste of heaven itself. It will +wipe all tears off our eyes when we hear our Lord saying to us, "Well +done!" when all our good works that we have done in the body shall be +found unto praise and honour and glory in the great day of Jesus Christ. + +At the same time, this same love of praise is one of our most besetting +and fatal temptations as long as we are in this false and double and +deceptive world. Sin, God curse it! has corrupted and poisoned +everything, the very best things of this life, and when the best things +are corrupted and poisoned they become the worst things. And praise does +not escape this universal and fatal law. Weak, evil, and self-seeking +men are near us, and we lean upon them, look to them, and listen to them. +We make them our strength and support, and seek repose and refreshment +from them. They cannot be all or any of these things to us; but we are +far on in life, we are done with life, before we have discovered that and +will admit that. Most men never discover and admit that till they are +out of this life altogether. Christ's praise and the applause of His +saints and angels are so future and so far away from us, and man's praise +and the applause of this world, hollow and false as it is, is so near us, +that we feed our souls on offal and garbage, when, already, in the +witness of a good conscience, we might be feasting our souls on the +finest of the wheat, and satisfying them with honey out of the rock. And, +then, this insatiable appetite of our hearts, being so degraded and +perverted, like all degraded and perverted appetites, becomes an iron- +fast slave to what it feeds upon. What miserable slaves we all are to +the approval and the praise of men! How they hold us in their bondage! +How we lick their hands and sit up on our haunches and go through our +postures for a crumb! How we crawl on our belly and lick their feet for +a stroke and a smile! What a hound's life does that man lead who lives +upon the approval and the praise and the patronage of men! What meanness +fills his mind; what baseness fills his heart! What a shameful leash he +is led about the world in! How kicked about and spat upon he is; while +not half so much as he knows all the time that he deserves to be! Better +far be a dog at once and bay the moon than be a man and fawn upon the +praises of men. + +If you would be a man at all, not to speak of a Christian man, starve +this appetite till you have quite extirpated it. You will never be safe +from it as long as it stirs within you. Extirpate it! Extirpate it! You +will never know true self-respect and you will never deserve to know it, +till you have wholly extirpated your appetite for praise. Put your foot +upon it, put it out of your heart. Stop fishing for it, and when you see +it coming, turn away and stop your ears against it. And should it still +insinuate itself, at any rate do not repeat to others what has already so +flattered and humbled and weakened you. Telling it to others will only +humble and weaken you more. By repeating the praise that you have heard +or read about yourself you only expose yourself and purchase +well-deserved contempt for yourself. And, more than that, by fishing for +praise you lay yourself open to all sorts of flatterers. Honest men, men +who truly respect and admire you, will show you their dignified regard +and appreciation of you and your work by their silence; while your leaky +slaves will crowd around you with floods of praise that they know well +will please and purchase you. And when you cannot with all your arts +squeeze a drop out of those who love and honour you, gallons will be +poured upon you by those who have respect neither for themselves nor for +you. Faugh! Flee from flatterers, and take up only with sternly true +and faithful men. "I am much less regardful," says Richard Baxter, "of +the approbation of men, and set much lighter store by their praise and +their blame, than I once did. All worldly things appear most vain and +unsatisfying to those who have tried them most. But while I feel that +this has had some hand in my distaste for man's praise, yet it is the +increasing impression on my heart of man's nothingness and God's +transcendent greatness; it is the brevity and vanity of all earthly +things, taken along with the nearness of eternity;--it is all this that +has at last lifted me above the blame and the praise of men." + +To conclude; let us make up our mind and determine to pass on to God on +the spot every syllable of praise that ever comes to our eyes or our +ears--if, in this cold, selfish, envious, and grudging world, any +syllable of praise ever should come to us. Even if pure and generous and +well-deserved praise should at any time come to us, all that does not +make it ours. The best earned usury is not the steward's own money to do +with it what he likes. The principal and the interest, and the trader +too, are all his master's. And, more than that, after the wisest and the +best trader has done his best, he will remain, to himself at least, a +most unprofitable servant. Pass on then immediately, dutifully, and to +its very last syllable, to God all the praise that comes to you. Wash +your hands of it and say, Not unto us, O God, not unto us, but unto Thy +name. And then, to take the most selfish and hungry-hearted view of this +whole matter, what you thus pass on to God as not your own but His, He +will soon, and in a better and safer world, return again to the full with +usury to you, and you again to God, and He again to you, and so on, all +down the pure and true and sweet and blessed life of heaven. + + + + +ATHEIST + + + " . . . without God [literally, atheists] in the world."--_Paul_. + +"Yonder is a man with his back toward Zion, and he is coming to meet us. +So he drew nearer and nearer, and at last came up to them. His name was +Atheist, and he asked them whither they were going? We are going to the +Mount Zion, they answered. Then Atheist fell into a very great laughter. +What is the meaning of your laughter? they asked. I laugh to see what +ignorant persons you are to take upon you so tedious a journey, and yet +are like to have nothing but your travel for your pains. Why, man? Do +you think we shall not be received? they said. Received! There is no +such place as you dream of in all this world. But there is in the world +to come, replied Christian. When I was at home, Atheist went on, in mine +own country I heard as you now affirm, and, from that hearing, I went out +to see, and have been seeking this city you speak of this twenty years, +but find no more of it than I did the first day I set out. And, still +laughing, he went his way." + +Having begun to tell us about Atheist, why did Bunyan not tell us more? +We would have thanked him warmly to-night for a little more about this +unhappy man. Why did the dreamer not take another eight or ten pages in +order to tell us, as only he could have told us, how this man that is now +Atheist had spent his past twenty years seeking Mount Zion? Those +precious unwritten pages are now buried in John Strudwick's vault in +Bunhill Fields, and no other man has arisen able to handle Bunyan's +biographic pen. Had Bunyan but put off the entrance of Christian and +Hopeful into the city till he had told us something more about the twenty +years it had taken this once earnest pilgrim to become an atheist, how +valuable an interpolation that would have been! What was it that made +this man to set out so long ago for the Celestial City? What was it that +so stoutly determined him to leave off all his old companions and turn +his back on the sweet refreshments of his youth? How did he do at the +Slough of Despond? Did he come that way? What about the Wicket Gate, +and the House Beautiful, and the Interpreter's House, and the Delectable +Mountains? What men, and especially what women, did he meet and converse +with on his way? What were his fortunes, and what his misfortunes? How +much did he lay out at Vanity Fair, and on what? At what point of his +twenty years' way did his youthful faith begin to shake, and his youthful +love begin to become lukewarm? And what was it that at last made him +quite turn round his back on Zion and his face to his own country? I +cannot forgive Bunyan to-night for not telling us the story of Atheist's +conversion, his pilgrimage, and his apostasy in full. + +At the same time, though it cannot be denied that Bunyan has lost at this +point a great opportunity for his genius and for our advantage,--at the +same time, he undoubtedly did a very courageous thing in introducing +Atheist at all; and, especially, in introducing him to us and making him +laugh so loudly at us when we are on the very borders of the land of +Beulah. A less courageous writer, and a writer less sure of his ground, +would have left out Atheist altogether; or, if he had felt constrained to +introduce him, would have introduced him at any other period of our +history rather than at this period. Under other hands than Bunyan's we +would have met with this mocking reprobate just outside the City of +Destruction; or, perhaps, among the booths of Vanity Fair; or, indeed, +anywhere but where we now meet him. And, that our greater-minded author +does not let loose the laughter of Atheist upon us till we are almost out +of the body is a stroke of skill and truth and boldness that makes us +glad indeed that we possess such a sketch at Bunyan's hand at all, all +too abrupt and all too short as that sketch is. In the absence, then, of +a full-length and finished portrait of Atheist, we must be content to +fall back on some of the reflections and lessons that the mere mention of +his name, the spot he passes us on, and the ridicule of his laughter, all +taken together, awaken in our minds. One rapid stroke of such a brush as +that of John Bunyan conveys more to us than a full-length likeness, with +all the strongest colours, of any other artist would be able to do. + +1. One thing the life-long admiration of John Bunyan's books has helped +to kindle and burn into my mind and my imagination is this: What a +universe of things is the heart of man! Were there nothing else in the +heart of man but all the places and all the persons and all the +adventures that John Bunyan saw in his sleep, what a world that would +open up in all our bosoms! All the pilgrims, good and bad--they, or the +seed and possibility of them all, are all in your heart and in mine. All +the cities, all the roads that lead from one city to another, with all +the paths and all the by-paths,--all the adventures, experiences, +endurances, conflicts, overthrows, victories,--all are within us and +never are to be seen anywhere else. Heaven and hell, God and the devil, +life and death, salvation and damnation, time and eternity, all are +within us. "There is no Mount Zion in all this world," bellowed out this +blinded fool. "No; I know that quite well," quickly responded Christian; +"but there is in the world to come." He would have said the whole truth, +and he would have been entirely right, had he taken time to add, "and in +the world within." "And more," he should have said to Atheist, "much +more in the world within than in any possible world to come." The +Celestial City, every Sabbath-school child begins gradually to +understand, is not up among the stars; till, as he grows older, he takes +in the whole of the New Testament truth that the kingdom of heaven is +wholly within him. You all understand, my brethren, that were we swept +in a moment up to the furthest star, by all that infinite flight we would +not be one hair's-breadth nearer the heavenly city. That is not the +right direction to that city. The city whose builder and maker is God +lies in quite a different direction from that altogether; not by +ascending up beyond sun and moon and stars to all eternity would we ever +get one hand's-breadth nearer God. But if you deny yourself sleep to- +night till you have read His book and bowed your knees in His closet; if, +for His sake, you deny yourself to-morrow when you are eating and +drinking; as often as you say, "Not my will, but Thine be done"; as often +as you humble yourself when others exalt themselves; as often as you +refuse praise and despise blame for His sake; as often as you forgive +before God your enemy, and rejoice with your friend,--Behold! the kingdom +of heaven, with its King and all His shining court of angels and saints +is around you;--is, indeed, within you. No; there is no such place. +Heaven is not in any place: heaven is in a person where it is at all; and +you are that person as often as you put off an earthly and put on a +heavenly mind. That mocking reprobate, with his secret heart all through +those twenty years hungering after the lusts of his youth,--he was wholly +right in what he so unintentionally said; there is no such place in all +this world. And, even if there were, it would spue him and all who are +like him out of its mouth. + +2. And, then, in all that universe of things that fills that bottomless +pit and shoreless sea the human heart, there is nothing deeper down in it +than just its deep and unsearchable atheism. The very deepest thing, and +the most absolutely inexpugnable thing, in every human heart is its +theism; its original and inextinguishable convictions about itself and +about God. But, all but as deep as that--for all around that, and all +over that, and soaking all through that--there lies a superincumbent mass +of sullen, brutish, malignant atheism. Nay, so deep down is the atheism +of all our hearts, that it is only one here and another there of the +holiest and the ripest of God's saints who ever get down to it, or even +get at their deepest within sight of it. Robert Fleming tells us about +Robert Bruce, that he was a man that had much inward exercise about his +own personal case, and had been often assaulted anent that great +foundation truth, if there was a God. And often, when he had come up to +the pulpit, after being some time silent, which was his usual way, he +would say, "I think it is a great matter to believe there is a God"; +telling the people that it was another thing to believe that than they +judged. But it was also known to his friends what extraordinary +confirmations he had from the Lord therein, and what near familiarity he +did attain to in his heart-converse with God: Yea, truly, adds Fleming, +some things I have had thereanent that seem so strange and marvellous +that I forbear to set them down. And in Halyburton's priceless _Memoirs_ +we read: "Hereby I was brought into a doubt about the truths of religion, +the being of God, and things eternal. Whenever I was in dangers or +straits and would build upon these things, a suspicion secretly haunted +me, what if the things are not? This perplexity was somewhat eased while +one day I was reading how Robert Bruce was shaken about the being of God, +and how at length he came to the fullest satisfaction." And in another +place: "Some days ago reading Ex. ix. and x., and finding this, 'That ye +may know that I am God' frequently repeated, and elsewhere in passages +innumerable, as the end of God's manifesting Himself in His word and +works; I observe from it that atheism is deeply rooted even in the Lord's +people, seeing they need to be taught this so much. The great difficulty +that the whole of revelation has to grapple with is atheism; its whole +struggle is to recover man to his first impressions of a God. This one +point comprehends the whole of man's recovery, just as atheism is the +whole of man's apostasy." And, again, in another part of the same great +book, Halyburton says: "I must observe, also, the wise providence of God, +that the greatest difficulties that lie against religion are hid from +atheists. All the objections I meet with in their writings are not +nearly so subtle as those which are often suggested to myself. The +reason of this is obvious from the very nature of the thing--such persons +take not a near-hand view of religion, and while persons stand at a +distance neither are the advantages nor the difficulties of religion +discerned." And now listen to Bunyan, that arch-atheist: "Whole floods +of blasphemies both against God, Christ, and the Scriptures were poured +upon my spirit, to my great confusion and astonishment. Against the very +being of God and of His only beloved Son; or, whether there were, in +truth, a God and a Christ, or no. Of all the temptations that ever I met +with in my life, to question the being of God and the truth of the Gospel +is the worst, and the worst to be borne. When this temptation comes it +takes away my girdle from me, and removeth the foundation from under me." + + "Fool, said my Muse to me, look in thy heart and write." + +And John Bunyan looked into his own deep and holy heart, and out of it he +composed this incident of Atheist. + +3. It may not be out of place at this point to look for a moment at some +of the things that agitate, stir up, and make the secret atheism of our +hearts to fluctuate and overflow. Butler has a fine passage in which he +points out that it is only the higher class of minds that are tempted +with speculative difficulties such as those were that assaulted Christian +and Hopeful after they were so near the end of their journey. Coarse, +commonplace, and mean-minded men have their probation appointed them +among coarse, mean, and commonplace things; whereas enlightened, +enlarged, and elevated men are exercised after the manner of Robert +Bruce, Thomas Halyburton, John Bunyan, and Butler himself. "The chief +temptations of the generality of the world are the ordinary motives to +injustice or unrestrained pleasure; but there are other persons without +this shallowness of temper; persons of a deeper sense as to what is +invisible and future. Now, these persons have their moral discipline set +them in that high region." The profound bishop means that while their +appetites and their tempers are the stumbling-stones of the most of men, +the difficult problems of natural and revealed and experimental religion +are the test and the triumph of other men. As we have just seen in the +men mentioned above. Students, whose temptations lie fully as much in +their intellects as in their senses, should buy (for a few pence) +Halyburton's Memoirs. "With Halyburton," says Dr. John Duncan, "I feel +great intellectual congruity. Halyburton was naturally a sceptic, but +God gave that sceptic great faith." + +Then again, what Atheist calls the "tediousness" of the journey has +undoubtedly a great hand in making some half-in-earnest men sceptics, if +not scoffers. Many of us here to-night who can never now take this +miserable man's way out of the tedium of the Christian life, yet most +bitterly feel it. Whether that tedium is inherent in that life, and +inevitable to such men as we are who are attempting that life; how far +that feature belongs to the very essence of the pilgrim life, and how far +we import our own tedium into the pilgrimage; the fact remains as Atheist +puts it. As Atheist in this book says, so the Atheist who is in our +hearts often says: We are like to have nothing for all our pains but a +lifetime of tedious travel. Yes, wherever the blame lies, there can be +no doubt about it, that what this hilarious scoffer calls the tediousness +of the way is but a too common experience among many of those who, +tediousness and all, will still cleave fast to it and will never leave +it. + +Then, again, great trials in life, great straits, dark and +too-long-continued providences, prayer unanswered, or not yet answered in +the way we dictate, bad men and bad causes growing like a green bay tree, +and good men and good work languishing and dying; these things, and many +more things such as these, of which this world of faith and patience is +full, prove quite too much for some men till they give themselves up to a +state of mind that is nothing better than atheism. "My evidences and my +certainty," says Halyburton, "were not answerable to the weight I was +compelled to lay upon them." A figure which Goodwin in his own tender +and graphic way takes up thus: "Set pins in a wall and fix them in ever +so loosely, yet, if you hang nothing upon them they will seem to stand +firm; but hang a heavy weight upon them, or even give them the least jog +as you pass, and the whole thing will suddenly come down. The wall is +God's word, the slack pin is our faith, and the weight and the jog are +the heavy burdens and the sudden shocks of life, and down our hearts go, +wall and pin and suspended vessel and all." + +When the church and her ministers, when the Scriptures and their +anomalies, and when the faults and failings of Christian men are made the +subject of mockery and laughter, the reverence, the fear, the awe, the +respect that all enter so largely into religion, and especially into the +religion of young people, is too easily destroyed; and not seldom the +first seeds of practical and sometimes of speculative atheism are thus +sown. The mischief that has been done by mockery and laughter to the +souls, especially of the young and the inexperienced, only the great day +will fully disclose. + +And then, two men of great weight and authority with us, tell us what we +who are ministers would have found out without them: this, namely, that +the greatest atheists are they who are ever handling holy things without +feeling them. + +"Is it true," said Christian to Hopeful, his fellow, "is it true what +this man hath said?" "Take heed," said Hopeful, "remember what it hath +cost us already for hearkening to such kind of fellows. What! No Mount +Zion! Did we not see from the Delectable Mountains the gate of the City? +And, besides, are we not to walk by faith? Let us go on lest the man +with the whip overtakes us again." Christian: "My brother, I said that +but to prove thee, and to fetch from thee a fruit of the honesty of thy +heart." Many a deep and powerful passage has Butler composed on that +thesis which Hopeful here supplies him with; and many a brilliant sermon +has Newman preached on that same text till he has made our +"predispositions to faith" a fruitful and an ever fresh commonplace to +hundreds of preachers. Yes; the best bulwark of faith is a good and +honest heart. To such a happy heart the truth is its own unshaken +evidence. To whom can we go but to Thee?--they who have such a heart +protest. The whole bent of such men's minds is toward the truth of the +gospel. Their instincts keep them on the right way even when their +reason and their observation are both confounded. As Newman keeps on +saying, they are "easy of belief." They cannot keep away from Christ and +His church. They cannot turn back. They must go on. Though He slay +them they will die yearning after Him. They often fall into great error +and into great guilt, but their seed remaineth in them, and they cannot +continue in error or in guilt, because they are born of God. They are +they in whom + + "Persuasion and belief + Have ripened into faith; and faith become + A passionate intuition." + + + + +HOPEFUL + + + "We are saved by hope."--_Paul_ + +Up till the time when Christian and Faithful passed through Vanity Fair +on their way to the Celestial City, Hopeful was one of the most light- +minded men in all that light-minded town. By his birth, and both on his +father's and his mother's side, Hopeful was, to begin with, a youth of an +unusually shallow and silly mind. In the jargon of our day he was a man +of a peculiarly optimistic temperament. No one ever blamed him for being +too subjective and introspective. It took many sharp trials and many +bitter disappointments to take the inborn frivolity and superficiality +out of this young man's heart. He was far on in his life, he was far on +even in his religious life, before you would have ever thought of calling +him a serious-minded man. Hopeful had been born and brought up to early +manhood in the town of Vanity, and he knew nothing better and desired +nothing better than to lay out his whole life and to rest all his hopes +on the things of the fair; on such things, that is, as houses, lands, +places, honours, preferments, titles, pleasures, and delights of all +sorts. And that vain and empty life went on with him, till, as he told +his companion afterwards, it had all ended with him in revelling, and +drinking, and uncleanness, and Sabbath-breaking, and all such things as +destroyed his soul. But in Hopeful's happy case also the blood of the +martyrs became the seed of the church. Hopeful, as he was afterwards +called, had suffered so many bitter disappointments and shipwrecks of +expectation from the things of the fair, that is to say, from the houses, +the places, the preferments, the pleasures and what not, of the fair, +that even his heart was ripe for something better than any of those +things, when, as God would have it, Christian and Faithful came to the +town. Hopeful was still hanging about the booths of the fair; he was +just fingering his last sixpence over a commodity that he knew quite well +would be like gall in his belly as soon as he had bought it; when,--what +is that hubbub that rolls down the street? Hopeful was always the first +to see and to hear every new thing that came to the town, and thus it was +that he was soon in the thick of the tumult that rose around Christian +and Faithful. Had those two pilgrims come to the town at any former +time, Hopeful would have been among the foremost to mock at and smite the +two men; but, to-day, Hopeful's heart is so empty, and his purse also, +that he is already won to their side by the loving looks and the wise and +sweet words of the two ill-used men. Some of the men of the town said +that the two pilgrims were outlandish and bedlamite men, but Hopeful took +courage to reprove some of the foremost of the mob. Till, at last, when +Faithful was at the stake, it was all that his companions could do to +keep back Hopeful from leaping up on the burning pile and embracing the +expiring man. And then, when He who overrules all things so brought it +about that Christian escaped out of their hands, who should come forth +and join him at the upward gate of the city but just Hopeful, who not +only joined himself to the lonely pilgrim, but told him also that there +were many more of the men of the city who would take their time and +follow after. And thus, adds his biographer, when one died to make his +testimony to the truth, another rose up out of his ashes to be a +companion to Christian. + +When Madame Krudener was getting her foot measured by a pietist +shoemaker, she was so struck with the repose and the sweetness and the +heavenly joy of the poor man's look and manner that she could not help +but ask him what had happened to him that he had such a look on his +countenance and such a light in his eye. She was miserable, though she +had all that heart could wish. She had all that made her one of the most +envied women in Europe; she had birth, talents, riches, rank, and the +friendship of princes and princesses, and yet she was of all women the +most miserable. And here was a poor chance shoemaker whose whole heart +was running over with a joy such that all her wealth could not purchase +to her heart one single drop of it. The simple soul soon told her his +secret; it was no secret: it was just Jesus Christ who had done it all. +And thus her poor shoemaker's happy face was the means of this great +lady's conversion. And, in like manner, it was the beholding of +Christian and Faithful in their words and in their behaviour at the fair +that decided Hopeful to join himself to Christian and henceforth to be +his companion. + +What were the things, asked Christian of his young companion, that first +led you to leave off the vanities of the fair and to think to be a +pilgrim? Many things, replied Hopeful. Sometimes if I did but meet a +good man in the street. Or if mine head began unaccountably, or mine +heart, to ache. Or if some one of my companions became suddenly sick. Or +if I heard the bell toll that some one was dead. But, especially, when I +thought of myself that I must quickly come to judgment. And then it is +told in the best style of the book how peace and rest and the beginning +of true satisfaction came to poor Hopeful's heart at last. But you must +promise me to read the passage for yourselves before you sleep to-night; +and to read it again and again till, like Hopeful's, your heart also is +full of joy, and your eyes full of tears, and your affections running +over with love to the name and to the people and to all the ways of Jesus +Christ. + +And then, it is very encouraging and reassuring to us to see how +Hopeful's true conversion so deepened and sobered and strengthened his +whole character. He remained to the end in his mental constitution and +whole temperament, as we say, the same man he had always been; but, while +remaining the same man, at the same time a most wonderful change +gradually began to come over him, till, by slow but sure degrees, he +became the Hopeful we know and look to and lean upon. To use his own +autobiographic words about himself, it was "by hearing and considering of +things that are Divine" that his natural levity was so completely whipped +out of his soul till he was made at last an indispensable companion to +Christian, strong-minded and serious-minded man as he was. "Conversion +to God," says William Law, "is often very sudden and instantaneous, +unexpectedly raised from variety of occasions. Thus, one by seeing only +a withered tree, another by reading the lives and deaths of the +antediluvian fathers, one by hearing of heaven, another of hell, one by +reading of the love or wrath of God, another of the sufferings of Christ, +may find himself, as it were, melted into penitence all of a sudden. It +may be granted also that the greatest sinner may in a moment be converted +to God, and may feel himself wounded in such a degree as perhaps those +never were who have been turning to God all their lives. But, then, it +is to be observed that this suddenness of change or flash of conviction +is by no means of the essence of true conversion. This stroke of +conversion is not to be considered as signifying our high state of a new +birth in Christ, or a proof that we are on a sudden made new creatures, +but that we are thus suddenly called upon and stirred up to look after a +newness of nature. The renewal of our first birth and state is something +entirely distinct from our first sudden conversion and call to +repentance. That is not a thing done in an instant, but is a certain +process, a gradual release from our captivity and disorder, consisting of +several stages and degrees, both of life and death, which the soul must +go through before it can have thoroughly put off the old man. It is well +worth observing that our Saviour's greatest trials were near the end of +His life. This might sufficiently show us that our first awakenings have +carried us but a little way; that we should not then begin to be self- +assured of our own salvation, but should remember that we stand at a +great distance from, and are in great ignorance of, our severest trials." +Such was the way that Christian in his experience and in his wisdom +talked to his young companion till his outward trials and the consequent +discoveries he made of his own weakness and corruption made even Hopeful +himself a sober-minded and a thoughtful man. "Where pain ends, gain ends +too." + +Then, again, no one can read Hopeful's remarkable history without +discovering this about him, that he showed best in adversity and +distress, just as he showed worst in deliverance and prosperity. It is a +fine lesson in Christian hope to descend into Giant Despair's dungeon and +hear the older pilgrim groaning and the younger pilgrim consoling him, +and, again, to stand on the bank of the last river and hear Hopeful +holding up Christian's drowning head. "Be of good cheer, my brother, for +I feel the bottom, and it is good!" Bless Hopeful for that, all you +whose deathbeds are still before you. For never was more true and fit +word spoken for a dying hour than that. Read, till you have it by heart +and in the dark, Hopeful's whole history, but especially his triumphant +end. And have some one bespoken beforehand to read Hopeful in the River +to you when you have in a great measure lost your senses, and when a +great horror has taken hold of your mind. "I sink in deep waters," cried +Christian, as his sins came to his mind, even the sins which he had +committed both since and before he came to be a pilgrim. "But I see the +gate," said Hopeful, "and men standing at it ready to receive us." "Read +to me where I first cast my anchor," said John Knox to his weeping wife. + +The Enchanted Ground, on the other hand, threatened to throw Hopeful back +again into his former light-minded state. And there is no saying what +shipwreck he might have made there had the older man not been with him to +steady and reprove and instruct him. As it was, a touch now and then of +his old vain temper returned to him till it took all his companion's +watchfulness and wariness to carry them both out of that second Vanity +Fair. "I acknowledge myself in a fault," said Hopeful to Christian, "and +had I been here alone I had run in danger of death. Hitherto, thy +company hath been my mercy, and thou shalt have a good reward for all thy +labour." + +Now, my brethren, in my opinion we owe a great debt of gratitude to John +Bunyan for the large and the displayed place he has given to Hopeful in +the _Pilgrim's Progress_. The fulness and balance and proportion of the +_Pilgrim's Progress_ are features of that wonderful book far too much +overlooked. So far as my reading goes I do not know any other author who +has at all done the justice to the saving grace of hope that John Bunyan +has done both in his doctrinal and in his allegorical works. Bunyan +stands alone and supreme not only for the insight, and the power with +which he has constructed the character and the career of Hopeful, but +even for having given him the space at all adequate to his merits and his +services. In those eighty-seven so suggestive pages that form the index +to Dr. Thomas Goodwin's works I find some hundred and twenty-four +references to "faith," while there are only two references to "hope." And +that same oversight and neglect runs through all our religious +literature, and I suppose, as a consequence, through all our preaching +too. Now that is not the treatment the Bible gives to this so essential +Christian grace, as any one may see at a glance who takes the trouble to +turn up his Cruden. Hope has a great place alongside of faith and love +in the Holy Scriptures, and it has a correspondingly large and eloquent +place in Bunyan. Now, that being so, why is it that this so great and so +blessed grace has so fallen out of our sermons and out of our hearts? May +God grant that our reading of Hopeful's autobiography and his subsequent +history to-night may do something to restore the blessed grace of hope to +its proper place both in our pulpit and in all our hearts. + +To kindle then, to quicken, and to anchor your hope, my brethren, may I +have God's help to speak for a little longer to your hearts concerning +this neglected grace! For, what is hope? Hope is a passion of the soul, +wise or foolish, to be ashamed of or to be proud of, just according to +the thing hoped for, and just according to the grounds of the hope. Hope +is made up of these two ingredients--desire and expectation. What we +greatly desire we take no rest till we find good grounds on which to +build up our expectations of it; and when we have found good grounds for +our expectations, then a glad hope takes possession of our hearts. Now, +to begin with, how is it with your desires? You are afraid to say much +about your expectations and your hopes. Well; let us come to your +hearts' desires.--Men of God, I will enter into your hearts and I will +tell you your hearts' desires better than you know them yourselves; for +the heart is deceitful above all things. The time was, when, like this +young pilgrim before he became a pilgrim, your desires were all set on +houses, and lands, and places, and honours, and preferments, and wives, +and children, and silver, and gold, and what not. These things at one +time were the utmost limit of your desires. But that has all been +changed. For now you have begun to desire a better city, that is, an +heavenly. What is your chief desire for this New Year? {2} Is it not a +new heart? Is it not a clean heart? Is it not a holy heart? Is it not +that the Holy Ghost would write the golden rule on the tables of your +heart? Does not God know that it is the deepest desire of your heart to +be able to love your neighbour as yourself? To be able to rejoice with +him in his joy as well as to weep with him in his sorrow? What would you +not give never again to feel envy in your heart at your brother, or +straitness and pining at his prosperity? One thing do I desire, said the +Psalmist, that mine ear may be nailed to the doorpost of my God: that I +may always be His servant, and may never wander from His service. Now, +that is your desire too. I am sure it is. You would not say it of +yourself, but I defy you to deny it when it is said about you. Well, +then, such things being found among your desires, what grounds have you +for expecting the fulfilment of such desires? What grounds? The best of +grounds and every ground. For you have the sure ground of God's word. +And you have more than His word: you have His very nature, and the very +nature of things. For shall God create such desires in any man's heart +only to starve and torture that man? Impossible! It were blasphemy to +suspect it. No. Where God has made any man to be so far a partaker of +the Divine nature as to change all that man's deepest desires, and to +turn them from vanity to wisdom, from earth to heaven, and from the +creature to the Creator, doubt not, wherever He has begun such a work, +that He will hasten to finish it. Yes; lift up your heavy hearts, all ye +who desire such things, for God hath sent His Son to say to you, Blessed +are ye that hunger and thirst after righteousness, for ye shall be +filled. Only, keep desiring. Desire every day with a stronger and a +more inconsolable desire. Desire, and ground your desire on God's word, +and then heave your hope like an anchor within the veil whither the +Forerunner is for you entered. May I so hope? you say. May I venture to +hope? Yes; not only may you hope, but you must hope. You are commanded +to hope. It is as much your bounden duty to hope always, and to hope for +the greatest and best things, as it is to repent of your sins, to love +God and your neighbour, to keep yourself pure, and to set a watch on the +door of your lips. You have been destroyed, I confess and lament it, for +lack of knowledge about the nature, the grounds, and the duty of hope. +But make up now for past neglect. Hope steadfastly, hope constantly, +hope boldly; hope for the best things, the greatest things, the most +divine and the most blessed things. If you forget to-night all else you +have heard to-day, I implore you not any longer to forget and neglect +this, that hope is your immediate, constant, imperative duty. No sin, no +depth of corruption in your heart, no assault on your heart from your +conscience, can justify you in ceasing to hope. Even when trouble "comes +tumbling over the neck of all your reformations" as it came tumbling on +Hopeful, let that only drive you the more deeply down into the true +grounds of hope; even against hope rejoice in hope. Remember the +Psalmist in the hundred-and-thirtieth Psalm,--down in the deeps, if ever +a fallen sinner was. Yet hear him when you cannot see him saying: I hope +in Thy word! And--for it is worthy to stand beside even that splendid +psalm,--I beseech you to read and lay to heart what Hopeful says about +himself in his conversion despair. + +And then, as if to justify that hope, there always come with it such +sanctifying influences and such sure results. The hope that you are one +day to awaken in the Divine likeness will make you lie down on your bed +every night in self-examination, repentance, prayer, and praise. The +hope that your eyes are one day to see Christ as He is will make you +purify yourself as nothing else will. The hope that you are to walk with +Christ in white will make you keep your garments clean; it will make you +wash them many times every day in the blood of the Lamb. The hope that +you are to cast your crown at His feet will make you watch that no man +takes your crown from you. The hope that you are to drink wine with Him +in His Father's kingdom will reconcile you meanwhile to water, lest with +your wine you stumble any of His little ones. The hope of hearing Him +say, Well done!--how that will make you labour and endure and not faint! +And the hope that you shall one day enter in through the gates into the +city, and have a right to the tree of life,--how scrupulous that will +make you to keep all His commandments! And this is one of His +commandments, that you gird up the loins of your mind, and hope to the +end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of +Jesus Christ. + + + + +TEMPORARY + + + "They are they, which, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and + have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation + fall away."--_Our Lord_. + +"Well, then, did you not know about ten years ago one Temporary in your +parts who was a forward man in religion? Know him! replied the other. +Yes. For my house not being above three miles from his house he would +ofttimes come to me, and that with many tears. Truly I pitied the man, +and was not altogether without hope of him; but one may see that it is +not every one who cries Lord, Lord. And now, since we are talking about +him, let us a little inquire into the reason of the sudden backsliding of +him and such others. It may be very profitable, said Christian, but do +you begin. Well, then, there are in my judgment several reasons for it." +And then, with the older man's entire approval, Hopeful sets forth +several reasons, taken from his own observation of backsliders, why so +many men's religion is such a temporary thing; why so many run well for a +time, and then stand still, and then turn back. + +1. The fear of man bringeth a snare, said Hopeful, moralising over his +old acquaintance Temporary. And how true that observation is every +evangelical minister knows to his deep disappointment. A young man comes +to his minister at some time of distress in his life, or at some time of +revival of religion in the community, or at an ordinary communion season, +and gives every sign that he is early and fairly embarked on an +honourable Christian life. He takes his place in the Church of Christ, +and he puts out his hand to her work, till we begin to look forward with +boastfulness to a life of great stability and great attainment for that +man. Our Lord, as we see from so many of His parables, must have had +many such cases among His first followers. Our Lord might be speaking +prophetically, as well as out of His own experience, so well do His +regretful and lamenting words fit into so many of our own cases to-day. +For, look at that young business man. He has been born and brought up in +the Church of Christ. He has gladdened more hearts than he knows by the +noble promise of his early days. Many admiring and loving eyes have been +turned on him as he took so hopefully the upward way. But a sifting-time +soon comes. A time of temptation comes. A time comes when sides must be +taken in some moral, religious, ecclesiastical controversy. This young +man is at that moment a candidate for a post that will bring distinction, +wealth, and social influence to him who holds it. And the candidate we +are so much interested in is admittedly a man of such outstanding talents +that he would at once get the post were it not that the holder of that +post must not have his name so much associated with such and such a +church, such and such political and religious opinions, and such and such +public men. He is told that. Indeed, he is not so dull as to need to be +told that. He has seen that all along. And at first it is a dreadful +wrench to him. He feels how far he is falling from his high ideals in +life; and, at first, and for a long time, it is a dreadful humiliation to +him. But, then, there are splendid compensations. And, better than +that, there are some good, and indeed compelling, reasons that begin to +rise up in our minds when we need them and begin to look for them, till +what at first seemed so mean and so contemptible, and so ungrateful, and +so dishonourable, as well as so spiritually perilous, comes to be faced +and gone through with positively on a ground of high principle, and, +indeed, of stern moral necessity. So deceitful is the human heart that +you could not believe what compelling reasons such a mean-spirited man +will face you with as to why he should leave all the ways he once so +delighted in for a piece of bread, and for the smile of the open enemies +of his church, and his faith, not to say his Saviour. You will meet with +several such men any afternoon coming home from their business. Sometimes +they have still some honest shame on their faces when they meet you; but +still oftener they pass you with a sullen hatred and a fierce defiance. +This is he who heard the word, and anon with joy received it. Yet had he +not root in himself, but dured for a while; for when tribulation or +persecution arose because of the word by and by he was offended. They +went out from us, says John, but they were not of us; for if they had +been of us they would no doubt have continued with us; but they went out +that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. + +2. Guilt, again, Hopeful went on, and to meditate terror, are so +grievous to most men, that they rather choose such ways as will but +harden their hearts still more and more. You all know what it is to +meditate terror? "Thine heart shall meditate terror," says the prophet, +"when thou sayest to thyself, who among us shall dwell with the devouring +fire? who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?" The fifty- +first Psalm is perhaps the best meditation both of guilt and of terror +that we have in the whole Bible. But there are many other psalms and +passages of psalms only second to the fifty-first Psalm, such as the +twenty-second, the thirty-eighth, the sixty-ninth, and the hundred-and- +thirtieth. Our Lord Himself also was meditating terror in the garden of +Gethsemane, and Paul both guilt and terror when he imagined himself both +an apostate preacher and a castaway soul. And John's meditations of +terror in the Revelation rose into those magnificent pictures of the Last +Judgment with which he has to all time covered the walls of the Seven +Churches. In his own _Grace Abounding_ there are meditations of terror +quite worthy to stand beside the most terrible things of that kind that +ever were written, as also in many others of our author's dramatical and +homiletical books. I read to you the other Sabbath morning a meditation +of terror that was found among Bishop Andrewes' private papers after his +death. You will not all have forgotten that meditation, but I will read +it to you to-night again. "How fearful," says Andrewes, in his terror, +"will Thy judgment be, O Lord, when the thrones are set, and the angels +stand around, and men are brought in, and the books are opened, and all +our works are inquired into, and all our thoughts are examined, and all +the hidden things of darkness! What, O God, shall Thy judgment that day +be upon me? Who shall quench my flame, who shall lighten my darkness, if +Thou pity me not? Lord, as Thou art loving, give me tears, give me +floods of tears, and give me all that this day, before it be too late. +For then will be the incorruptible Judge, the horrible judgment-seat, the +answer without excuse, the inevitable charge, the shameful punishment, +the endless Gehenna, the pitiless angels, the yawning hell, the roaring +stream of fire, the unquenchable flame, the dark prison, the rayless +darkness, the bed of live coals, the unwearied worm, the indissoluble +chains, the bottomless chaos, the impassable wall, the inconsolable cry. +And none to stand by me; none to plead for me; none to snatch me out." +Now, no Temporary ever possessed anything like that in his own +handwriting among his private papers. A meditation like that, written +out with his own hand, and hidden away under lock and key, will secure +any man from it, even if he had been appointed to backsliding and +reprobation. Bishop Andrewes, as any one will see who reads his _Private +Devotions_, was the chief of sinners; but his discovered and deciphered +papers will all speak for him when they are spread out before the great +white throne, "glorious in their deformity, being slubbered," as his +editors say, "with his pious hands, and watered with his penitential +tears." + +Thomas Shepard's _Ten Virgins_ is the most terrible book upon Temporaries +that ever was written. Temporaries never once saw their true vileness, +he keeps on saying. Temporaries are, no doubt, wounded for sin +sometimes, but never in the right place nor to the right depth. And +again, sin, and especially heart-sin, is never really bitter to +Temporaries. In an "exhortation to all new beginners, and so to all +others," "Be sure," Shepard says, "your wound for sin at first is deep +enough. For all the error in a man's faith and sanctification springs +from his first error in his humiliation. If a man's humiliation be +false, or even weak or little, then his faith and his hold of Christ are +weak and little, and his sanctification counterfeit. But if a man's +wound be right, and his humiliation deep enough, that man's faith will be +right and his sanctification will be glorious. The esteem of Christ is +always little where sin lies light." And Hopeful himself says a thing at +this point that is quite worthy of Shepard himself, such is its depth and +insight. He speaks of the righteous actually _loving_ the sight of their +misery. He does not explain what he means by that startling language +because he is talking all the time, as he knows quite well, to one who +understood all that before he was born. Nor will I attempt to explain or +to vindicate what he says. Those of you who love the sight of your own +misery as sinners will understand what Hopeful says without any +explanation; while those who do not understand him would only be the more +stumbled by any explanation of him. The love of the sight of their +misery, and the unearthly sweetness of their sorrow for sin, are only +another two of those provoking paradoxes of which the lives of God's true +saints are full--paradoxes and impossibilities and incoherencies that +make the literature of experimental religion to be positively hateful and +unbearable to Temporary and to all his self-seeking and apostate kindred. + +3. But even where the consciences of such men are occasionally awakened, +proceeds Hopeful, in his so searching discovery of Temporaries, yet their +minds are not changed. There you are pretty near the business, replied +his fellow; for the bottom of all is, for want of a change of their mind +and will. Now, one would have been afraid and ashamed for one moment to +suspect that Temporary's mind was not completely changed, so "forward" +was he at first in his religion. But, no: forward before all his +neighbours as Temporary was, to begin with, yet all the time his mind was +not really changed. His forwardness did not properly spring out of his +true mind at all, but only out of his momentarily awakened conscience and +his momentarily excited heart. A sinner with a truly changed mind is +never forward. His mind is so changed that forwardness in anything is +utterly alien to it, and especially all forwardness in the profession of +religion. The change that had taken place in Temporary, whatever was the +seat of it, only led him to bully men like Christian and Hopeful, who +would not go fast enough for him. "Come," said Pliable, in the beginning +of the book, "come on and let us mend our pace." "I cannot go so fast as +I would," humbly replied Christian, "because of this burden on my back." +It is a common observation among mountaineers that he who takes the hill +at the greatest spurt is the last climber to come to the top, and that +many who so ostentatiously make spurts at the bottom of the hill never +come within sight of the top at all. And this is one of the constant +dangers that wait on all revivals, religious retreats, conferences, and +even communion seasons. Our hot fits, the hotter they are, are only the +more likely, unless we take the greatest care, to cast us down into all +the more deadly a chill. It is this danger that our Lord points out so +plainly in His parable of apostasy. The same is he, says our Lord, that +heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it; yet hath he not root in +himself, but dureth for a while. In Hopeful's words, his mind and will +were never changed with all his joy, only his passing moods and his +momentary emotions. + +Multitudes of men who are as forward at first as Pliable and Temporary +were turn out at last to have no root in themselves; but here and there +you will discover a man who is all root together. There are some men +whose whole mind and heart and will, whose whole inward man, has gone to +root. All the strength and all the fatness of their religious life +retreat into its root. They have no leaves at all, and they have too +little fruit as yet; but you should see their roots. Only, no eye but +the eye of God can see sorrow for sin--secret and sore humiliation on +account of secret sin--the incessant agony that goes on within between +the flesh and the spirit, between sin and grace, between very hell and +heaven itself. To know your own evil hearts, my brethren, say to you on +that subject what any Temporary will, is the very root of the whole +matter to you. Whatever Dr. Newman's mistakes as to outward churches may +have been, he was a master of the human heart, the most difficult of all +matters to master. Listen, then, to what he says on the matter now in +hand. "Now, unless we have some just idea of our hearts and of sin, we +can have no right idea of a Moral Governor, a Saviour, or a Sanctifier; +that is, in professing to believe in them we shall be using words without +attaching any distinct meaning to them. Thus self-knowledge is at the +root of all real religious knowledge; and it is vain,--it is worse than +vain,--it is a deceit and a mischief, to think to understand the +Christian doctrines as a matter of course, merely by being taught by +books, or by attending sermons, or by any outward means, however +excellent, taken by themselves. For it is in proportion as we search our +hearts and understand our own nature that we understand what is meant by +an Infinite Governor and Judge; it is in proportion as we comprehend the +nature of disobedience and our actual sinfulness that we feel what is the +blessing of the removal of sin, redemption, pardon, sanctification, which +otherwise are mere words. God speaks to us primarily in our hearts. Self- +knowledge is the key to the precepts and doctrines of Scripture. The +very utmost that any outward notices of religion can do is to startle us +and make us turn inward and search our hearts; and then, when we have +experienced what it is to read ourselves, we shall profit by the doctrine +of the Church and the Bible." My brethren, the temper in which you +receive that passage, and receive it from its author, may be safely taken +by you as a sure presage whether you are to turn out a Temporary and a +Castaway or no. + +Now, to conclude with a word of admission, and, bound up with it, a word +of encouragement. After all that has been said, I fully admit that we +are all Temporaries to begin with. We all cool down from our first heat +in religion. We all halt from our first spurt. We all turn back from +faith and from duty and from privilege through our fear of men, or +through our corrupt love of ourselves, or through our coarse-minded love +of this present world. Only, those who are appointed to perseverance, +and through that to eternal life, always kindle again; they are kindled +again, and they love the return of their lost warmth. They recover +themselves and address themselves again and again to the race that is +still set before them. They prove themselves not to be of those who draw +back unto perdition, but of those that believe to the saving of the soul. +Now, if you have only too good ground to suspect that you are but a +temporary believer, what are you to do to make your sure escape out of +that perilous state? What, but to keep on believing? You must cry +constantly, Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief! When at any time +you are under any temptation or corruption, and you feel that your faith +and your love are letting slip their hold of Christ and of eternal life, +then knot your weak heart all the faster to the throne of grace, to the +cross of Christ, and to the gate of heaven. Give up all your mind and +heart, and all that is within you, to the one thing needful. Labour +night and day in your own heart at believing on Christ, at loving your +neighbour, and at discovering, denying, and crucifying yourself. It will +all pay you in the long run. For if you do all these things, and +persistently do them, then, though you are at this moment all but dead to +all divine things, and all but a reprobate, it will be found at last that +all the time your name was written among the elect in heaven. + +The perseverance of the saints, the "five points" notwithstanding, is not +a foregone conclusion. The final perseverance of the ripest and surest +saint is all made up of ever-new beginnings in repentance, in faith, in +love, and in obedience. Begin, then, every new day to repent anew, to +return anew, to believe and to love anew. And if all your New-Year +repentances and returnings and reformations are all already proved to be +but temporary--even if they lie all around you already a bitter mockery +of all your professions--still, begin again. Begin to-night, and begin +again to-morrow morning. Spend all the remainder of your days on earth +beginning. And, ere ever you are aware, the final perseverance of +another predestinated saint will be found accomplished in you. + + + + +SECRET + + + "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him."--_David_. + +A truly religious life is always a secret life: it is a life hid, as Paul +has it, with Christ in God. The secret of the Lord, says the Psalmist, +is with them that fear Him. And thus it is that when men begin to fear +God, both their hearts and their lives are henceforth full of all kinds +of secrets that are known to themselves and to God only. It was when +Christiana's fearful thoughts began to work in her mind about her husband +whom she had lost--it was when all her unkind, unnatural, and ungodly +carriages to her dear friend came into her mind in swarms, clogged her +conscience, and loaded her with guilt--it was then that Secret knocked at +her door. "Next morning," so her opening history runs, "when she was up, +and had prayed to God, and talked with her children awhile, one knocked +hard at the door to whom she spake out, saying, If thou comest in God's +name, come in. So he who was at the door said, Amen, and opened the +door, and saluted her with, Peace be to this house. The which when he +had done, he said, Christiana, knowest thou wherefore I am come? Then +she blushed and trembled, also her heart began to wax warm with desires +to know whence he came, and what was his errand to her. So he said unto +her, My name is Secret, I dwell with those that are high. It is talked +of where I dwell as if thou hadst a desire to go thither; also, there is +a report that thou art aware now of the evil thou formerly didst to thy +husband in hardening of thy heart against his way, and in keeping of thy +babes in their ignorance. Christiana, the Merciful One has sent me to +tell thee that He is a God ready to forgive, and that He taketh delight +to multiply to pardon offences. He would also have thee know that He +inviteth thee to come into His presence, even to His table, and that He +will there feed thee with the fat of His house, and with the heritage of +Jacob thy father. Christiana at all this was greatly abashed in herself, +and she bowed her head to the ground, while her visitor proceeded and +said, Christiana, here is a letter for thee which I have brought from thy +husband's King. So she took it and opened it, and, as she opened it, it +smelt after the manner of the best perfume; also it was written in +lettering of gold. The contents of the letter was to this effect, that +the King would have her do as did Christian her husband, for that was the +way to come to the city and to dwell in His presence with joy for ever. +At this the good woman was completely overcome. So she said to her +visitor, Sir, will you carry me and my children with you that we may go +and worship this King? Then said the heavenly visitor, Christiana, the +bitter is before the sweet. Thou must through troubles, as did he that +went before thee, enter this celestial city." And so on. + +1. Now, to begin with, you will have noticed the way in which Christiana +was prepared for the entrance of Secret into her house. She was a widow. +She sat alone in that loneliness which only widows know and understand. +More than lonely, she was very miserable. "Mark this," says the author +on the margin, "you that are churls to your godly relations." For this +widow felt sure that her husband had been taken from her because of her +cruel behaviour to him. Her past unnatural carriages toward her husband +now rent the very caul of her heart in sunder. And, again and again, +about that same time strange dreams would sometimes visit her. Dreams +such as this. She would see her husband in a place of bliss with a harp +in his hand, standing and playing upon it before One that sat on a throne +with a rainbow round His head. She saw also as if he bowed his head with +his face to the paved work that was under the Prince's feet, saying, I +heartily thank my Lord and King for bringing me to this place. You will +easily see how ready this lone woman was with all that for his entrance +who knocked and said, Peace be to this house, and handed her a letter of +perfume from her husband's King. Then you will have remarked also some +of the things this visitor from on high said to her of the place whence +he had come. He told her, to begin with, how they sometimes talked about +her in his country. She thought that she was a lonely and forgotten +widow, and that no one cared what became of her. But her visitor assured +her she was quite wrong in thinking that. He had often himself heard her +name mentioned in conversation above; and the most hopeful reports, he +told her, were circulated from door to door that she was actually all but +started on the upward way. Yes, he said, and we have a place prepared +for you on the strength of these reports, a place among the immortals +close beside your husband. And all that, as you will not wonder, was the +beginning of Christiana's secret life. After that morning she never +again felt alone or forgotten. I am not alone, she would after that say, +when any of her old neighbours knocked at her door. No, I am not alone, +but if thou comest in God's name, come in. + +2. And from that day a long succession of secret providences began to +enter Christiana's life, till, as time went on, her whole life was filled +full of secret providences. And not her present life only, but her +discoveries of God's secret providences towards her and hers became +retrospective also, till both her own parentage and birth, her husband's +parentage and birth also, the day she first saw him, the day of their +espousals, the day of their marriage, and the day of his death, all shone +out now as so many secret and special providences of God toward her. +Bishop Martensen has a fine passage on the fragmentariness of our +knowledge, not only of divine providence as a whole, but even of those +divine providences that fill up our own lives. And he warns us that, +till we have heard the "Prologue in Heaven," many a riddle in our lives +must of necessity remain unsolved. Christiana could not have told her +inquiring children what a prologue was, nor an epilogue either, but many +were the wise and winning discourses she held with her boys about their +father now in heaven, about her happiness in having had such a father for +her children, and about their happiness that the road was open before +them to go to where he now is. And there are many poor widows among +ourselves who are wiser than all their teachers, because they are in that +school of experience into which God takes His afflicted people and opens +to them His deepest secrets. They remember, with Job, when the secret of +the Lord was first upon their tabernacle. Their widowed hearts are full +of holy household memories. They remember the days when the candle of +the Lord shone upon their head when they washed their steps with butter, +and the rock poured them out rivers of oil. And still, when, like Job +also, they sit solitary among the ashes, the secret of the Lord is only +the more secretly and intimately with them. John Bunyan was well fitted +to be Christiana's biographer, because his own life was as full as it +could hold of these same secret and special providences. One day he was +walking--so he tells us--in a good man's shop, bemoaning himself of his +sad and doleful state--when a mighty rushing wind came in through the +window and seemed to carry words of Scripture on its wings to Bunyan's +disconsolate soul. He candidly tells us that he does not know, after +twenty years' reflection, what to make of that strange dispensation. That +it took place, and that it left the most blessed results behind it, he is +sure; but as to how God did it, by what means, by what instruments, both +the rushing wind itself and the salutation that accompanied it, he is +fain to let lie till the day of judgment. And many of ourselves have had +strange dispensations too that we must leave alone, and seek no other +explanation of them for the present but the blessed results of them. We +have had divine descents into our lives that we can never attempt to +describe. Interpositions as plain to us as if we had both seen and +spoken with the angel who executed them. Miraculous deliverances that +throw many Old and New Testament miracles into the shade. Providential +adaptations and readjustments also, as if all things were actually and +openly and without a veil being made to work together for our good. +Extrications also; nets broken, snares snapped, and such pavilions of +safety and solace opened to us that we can find no psalm secret and +special enough in which to utter our life-long astonishment. Importunate +prayers anticipated, postponed, denied, translated, transmuted, and then +answered till our cup was too full; sweet changed to bitter, and bitter +changed to sweet, so wonderfully, so graciously, and so often, that words +fail us, and we can only now laugh and now weep over it all. Poor Cowper +knew something about it-- + + "God moves in a mysterious way + His wonders to perform; + He plants His footsteps in the sea, + And rides upon the storm. + + "Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take, + The clouds ye so much dread + Are big with mercy, and shall break + In blessings on your head. + + "Blind unbelief is sure to err, + And scan his work in vain; + God is His own interpreter, + And He will make it plain." + +3. Secret scriptures also--from that enlightening day Christiana's Bible +became full of them. Peter says that no prophecy is of any private +interpretation; and, whatever he means by that, what he says must be +true. But Christiana would have understood the apostle better if he had +said the exact opposite of that,--if not about the prophecies, at least +about the psalms. Leave the prophecies in this connection alone; but of +the psalms it may safely be said that it is neither the literal nor the +historical nor the mystical interpretation that gets at the heart of +those supreme scriptures. It is the private, personal, and, indeed, +secret interpretation that gets best at the deepest heart of the psalms. +An old Bible came into my hands the other day--a Bible that had seen +service--and it opened of its own accord at the Book of Psalms. On +turning over the yellow leaves I found a date and a deep indentation +opposite these words: "Commit thy way unto the Lord: trust also in Him: +and He will bring it to pass." And as I looked at the figures on the +margin, and at the underscored text, I felt as if I were on the brink of +an old-world secret. "Create in me a clean heart" had a significant +initial also; as had this: "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit." +The whole of the hundred-and-third psalm was bracketed off from all +public interpretation; while the tenth, the cardinal verse of that secret +psalm, had a special seal set upon it. Judging from its stains and scars +and other accidents, the whole of the hundred-and-nineteenth psalm had +been a special favourite; while the hundred-and-forty-third also was all +broidered round with shorthand symbols. But the secret key of all those +symbols and dates and enigmatical marks was no longer to be found; it had +been carried away in the owner's own heart. But, my head being full of +Christiana at the time, I felt as if I held her own old Bible in my hand +as I turned over those ancient leaves. + +4. Our Lord so practised secrecy Himself in His fasting, in His praying, +and in His almsgiving, and He makes so much of that same secrecy in all +His teaching, as almost to make the essence of all true religion to stand +in its secrecy. "When thou prayest," says our Lord, "shut thy door and +pray in secret." As much as to say that we are scarcely praying at all +when we are praying in public. Praying in public is so difficult that +new beginners, like His disciples, have to practise that so difficult art +for a long time in secret. Public prayer has so many besetting sins, it +is open to so many temptations, distractions, and corruptions, that it is +almost impossible to preserve the real essence of prayer in public +prayer. But in secret all those temptations and distractions are happily +absent. We have no temptation to be too long in secret prayer, or too +loud, or too eloquent. Stately old English goes for nothing in secret +prayer. We never need to go to our knees in secret trembling, lest we +lose the thread of our prayer, or forget that so fit and so fine +expression. The longer we are the better in secret prayer. Much +speaking is really a virtue in secret prayer; much speaking and many +repetitions. Also, we can put things into our secret prayers that we +dare not come within a thousand miles of in the pulpit, or the prayer- +meeting, or the family. We can enter into the most plain-spoken +particulars about ourselves in secret. We can put our proper name upon +ourselves, and upon our actions, and especially upon our thoughts when +our door is shut. Then, again, we can pray for other people by name in +secret; we can enter, so far as we know them, into all their +circumstances in a way it is impossible to do anywhere but in the utmost +secrecy. We can, in short, be ourselves in secret; and, unless it is to +please or to impress men, we had better not pray at all unless we are +ourselves when we are engaged in it. You can be yourself, your very +worst self; nay, you must be, else you will not long pray in secret, and +even if you did you would not be heard. I do not remember that very much +is said in so many words in her after-history about Christiana's habits +of closet-prayer. But that Secret taught her the way, and waited till +she had tasted the sweetness and the strength of being a good while on +her knees alone, I am safe to say; indeed, I read it between the lines in +all her after-life. She was rewarded openly in a way that testifies to +much secret prayer; that is to say, in the early conversion of her +children, in the way they settled in life, and such like things. Pray +much for those things in secret that you wish to possess openly. + +5. But perhaps the best and most infallible evidence we can have of the +truth of our religion in this life is in the steady increase of our +secret sinfulness. Christiana had no trouble with her own wicked heart +so long as she was a woman of a wicked life. But directly she became a +new creature, her heart began to swarm, such is her own expression, with +sinful memories, sinful thoughts, and sinful feelings; till she had need +of some one ever near her, like Greatheart, constantly to assure her that +those cruel and deadly swarms, instead of being a bad sign of her +salvation, were the very best signs possible of her good estate. Humility +is the foundation of all our graces, and there is no humility so deep and +so ever-deepening as that evangelical humility which in its turn rises +out of and rests upon secret sinfulness. Not upon acts of secret sin. Do +not mistake me. Acts of secret sin harden the heart and debauch the +conscience. But I speak of that secret, original, unexplored, and +inexpugnable sinfulness out of which all a sinner's actual sins, both +open sins and secret, spring; and out of which a like life of open and +actual sins would spring in God's very best saints, if only both He and +they did not watch night and day against them. Sensibility to sin, or +rather to sinfulness, is far and away the best evidence of sanctification +that is possible to us in this life. It is this keen and bitter +sensibility that secures, amid all oppositions and obstructions, the true +saint's onward and upward progress. Were it not for the misery of their +own hearts, God's best saints would fall asleep and go back like other +men. A sinful heart is the misery of all miseries. It is the deepest +and darkest of all dungeons. It is the most painful and the most +loathsome of all diseases. And the secrecy of it all adds to the +bitterness and the gall of it all. We may know that other men's hearts +are as sinful as our own, but we do not feel their sinfulness. We cannot +sensibly feel humiliation, bondage, sickness, and self-loathing on +account of another man's envy, or ill-will, or resentment, or cruelty, or +falsehood, or impurity. All these things must be our own before we can +enter into the pain and the shame of them; but, when we do, then we taste +what death and hell are indeed. As I write these feeble words about it, +a devil's shaft of envy that was shot all against my will into my heart +this morning, still, after a whole day, rankles and festers there. I +have been on my knees with it again and again; I have stood and looked +into an open grave to-day; but there it is sucking at my heart's blood +still, like a leech of hell. Who can understand his errors? Cleanse +Thou me from secret faults. Create in me a clean heart, O God, O +wretched man that I am! "Let a man," says William Law when he is +enforcing humility, "but consider that if the world knew all that of him +which he knows of himself: if they saw what vanity and what passions +govern his inside, and what secret tempers sully and corrupt his best +actions, he would have no more pretence to be honoured and admired for +his goodness and wisdom than a rotten and distempered body to be loved +and admired for its beauty and comeliness. This is so true, and so known +to the hearts of almost all people, that nothing would appear more +dreadful to them than to have their hearts fully discovered to the eyes +of all beholders. And, perhaps, there are very few people in the world +who would not rather choose to die than to have all their secret follies, +the errors of their judgments, the vanity of their minds, the falseness +of their pretences, the frequency of their vain and disorderly passions, +their uneasinesses, hatreds, envies, and vexations made known to all the +world." Where did William Law get that terrible passage? Where could he +get it but in the secret heart of the miserable author of the _Serious +Call_? + +6. The half cannot be told of the guilt and the corruption, the pain and +the shame and the manifold misery of secret sin; but all that will be +told, believed, and understood by all men long before the full +magnificence of their sanctification, and the superb transcendence of +their blessedness, will even begin to be described to God's secret +saints. For, all that sleepless, cruel, and soul-killing pain, and all +that shameful and humbling corruption,--all that means, all that is, so +much holiness, so much heaven, working itself out in the soul. All that +is so much immortal life, spotless beauty, and incorruptible joy already +begun in the soul. Every such pang in a holy heart is a death-pang of +another sin and a birth-pang of another grace. Brotherly love is at last +being born never to die in that heart where envy and malice and +resentment and revenge are causing inward agony. And humility and +meekness and the whole mind of Christ are there where pride and anger and +ill-will are felt to be very hell itself. And holiness, even as God is +holy, will soon be there for ever where the sinfulness of sin is a +sinner's acutest sorrow. "As for me," said one whose sin was ever before +him, "I will behold Thy face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when +I wake with Thy likeness." + + + + +MRS. TIMOROUS + + + "But the fearful [literally, the timid and the cowardly] shall have + their part in the second death."--_Revelation xxi_. + +No sooner had Secret bidden Christiana farewell than she began with all +her might to make ready for her great journey. "Come, my children, let +us pack up and begone to the gate that leads to the Celestial City, that +we may see your father and be with him, and with his companions, in +peace, according to the laws of that land." And then: "Come in, if you +come in God's name!" Christiana called out, as two of her neighbours +knocked at her door. "Having little to do at home this morning," said +the elder of the two women, "I have come across to kill a little time +with you. I spent last night with Mrs. Light-mind, and I have some good +news for you this morning." "I am just preparing for a journey this +morning," said Christiana, packing up all the time, "and I have not so +much as one moment to spare." You know yourselves what Christiana's +nervousness and almost impatience were. You know how it upsets your good +temper and all your civility when you are packing up for a long absence +from home, and some one comes in, and will talk, and will not see how +behindhand and how busy you are. "For what journey, I pray you?" asked +Mrs. Timorous, for that was her visitor's name. "Even to go after my +good husband," the busy woman said, and with that she fell a-weeping. But +you must read the whole account of that eventful morning in Christiana's +memoirs for yourselves till you have it, as Secret said, by +root-of-heart. On the understanding that you are not total strangers to +that so excellently-written passage I shall now venture a few +observations upon it. + +1. Well, to begin with, Mrs. Timorous was not a bad woman, as women went +in that town and in that day. Her companions,--her gossips, as she would +have called them,--were far worse women than she was; and, had it not +been for her family infirmity, had it not been for that timid, +hesitating, lukewarm, and half-and-half habit of mind which she had +inherited from her father, there is no saying what part she might have +played in the famous expedition of Christiana and Mercy and the boys. Her +father had been a pilgrim himself at one time; but he had now for a long +time been known in the town as a turncoat and a temporary, and all his +children had unhappily taken after their father in that. Had her father +held on as he at one time had begun--had he held on in the face of all +fear and all danger as Christiana's noble husband had done--to a +certainty his daughter would have started that morning with Christiana +and her company, and would have been, if a timid, easily scared, and +troublesome pilgrim, yet as true a pilgrim, and made as welcome at last, +as, say, Miss Much-afraid, Mr. Fearing, and Mr. Ready-to-halt were made. +But her father's superficiality and shakiness, and at bottom his warm +love of this world and his lukewarm love of the world to come, had +unfortunately all descended to his daughter, till we find her actually +reviling Christiana on that decisive morning, and returning to her dish +of tea and tittle-tattle with Mrs. Bats-eyes, Mrs. Inconsiderate, Mrs. +Light-mind, and Mrs. Know-nothing. + +2. The thing that positively terrified Mrs. Timorous at the very thought +of setting out with Christiana that morning was that intolerable way in +which Christiana had begun to go back upon her past life as a wife and a +mother. Christiana could not hide her deep distress, and, indeed, she +did not much try. Such were the swarms of painful memories that her +husband's late death, the visit of Secret, and one thing and another had +let loose upon Christiana's mind, that she could take pleasure in nothing +but in how she was to escape away from her past life, and how she could +in any way mend it and make up for it where she could not escape from it. +"You may judge yourself," said Mrs. Timorous to Mrs. Light-mind, "whether +I was likely to find much entertainment with a woman like that!" For, +Mrs. Timorous too, you must know, had a past life of her own; and it was +that past life of hers all brought back by Christiana's words that +morning that made Mrs. Timorous so revile her old friend and return to +the society we so soon see her with. Now, is not this the case, that we +all have swarms of evil memories that we dare not face? There is no +single relationship in life that we can boldly look back upon and fully +face. As son or as daughter, as brother or as sister, as friend or as +lover, as husband or as wife, as minister or as member, as master or as +servant--what swarms of hornet-memories darken our hearts as we so look +back! Let any grown-up man, with some imagination, tenderness of heart, +and integrity of conscience, go back step by step, taking some time to +it,--at a new year, say, or a birthday, or on some such suitable +occasion: let him go over his past life back to his youth and +childhood--and what an intolerable burden will be laid on his heart +before he is done! What a panorama of scarlet pictures will pass before +his inward eye! What a forest of accusing fingers will be pointed at +him! What hissing curses will be spat at him both by the lips of the +living and the dead! What untold pains he will see that he has caused to +the innocent and the helpless! What desolating disappointments, what +shipwrecks of hope to this man and to that woman! What a stone of +stumbling he has been to many who on that stone have been for ever broken +and lost! What a rock of offence even his mere innocent existence, all +unknown to himself till afterwards, has been! Swarms, said Christiana. +Swarms of hornets armed, said Samson. And many of us understand what +that bitter word means better than any commentator on Bunyan or on Milton +can tell us. One of the holiest men the Church of England ever produced, +and one of her best devotional writers, used to shut his door on the +night of every first day of the week, and on his knees spread out a +prayer which always contained this passage: "I worship Thee, O God, on my +face. I smite my breast and say with the publican, God be merciful to me +a sinner; the chief of sinners; a sinner far above the publican. Despise +me not--an unclean worm, a dead dog, a putrid corpse. Despise me not, +despise me not, O Lord. But look upon me with those eyes with which Thou +didst look upon Magdalene at the feast, Peter in the hall, and the thief +on the cross. O that mine eyes were a fountain of tears that I might +weep night and day before Thee! I despise and bruise myself that my +penitence is not deeper, is not fuller. Help Thou mine impenitence, and +more and more pierce, rend, and crush my heart. My sins are more in +number than the sand. My iniquities are multiplied, and I have no +relief." Perish your Puritanism, and your prayer-books too! I hear some +high-minded and indignant man saying. Perish your Celestial City and all +my desire after it, before I say the like of that about myself! Brave +words, my brother; brave words! But there have been men as blameless as +you are, and as brave-hearted over it, who, when the scales fell off +their eyes, were heard crying out ever after: O wretched man that I am! +And: Have mercy on me, the chief of sinners! And so, if it so please +God, will it yet be with you. + +3. "Having had little to do this morning," said Mrs. Timorous to Mrs. +Light-mind, "I went to give Christiana a visit." "Law," I read in his +most impressive Life, "by this time was well turned fifty, but he rose as +early and was as soon at his desk as when he was still a new, +enthusiastic, and scrupulously methodical student at Cambridge." Summer +and winter Law rose to his devotions and his studies at five o'clock, not +because he had imperative sermons to prepare, but because, in his own +words, it is more reasonable to suppose a person up early because he is a +Christian than because he is a labourer or a tradesman or a servant. I +have a great deal of business to do, he would say. I have a hardened +heart to change; I have still the whole spirit of religion to get. When +Law at any time felt a temptation to relax his rule of early devotion, he +again reminded himself how fast he was becoming an old man, and how far +back his sanctification still was, till he flung himself out of bed and +began to make himself a new heart before the servants had lighted their +fires or the farmers had yoked their horses. Shame on you, he said to +himself, to lie folded up in a bed when you might be pouring out your +heart in prayer and in praise, and thus be preparing yourself for a place +among those blessed beings who rest not day and night saying, Holy, Holy, +Holy. "I have little to do this morning," said Mrs. Timorous. "But I am +preparing for a journey," said Christiana. "I have now a price put into +my hand to get gain, and I should be a fool of the greatest size if I +should have no heart to strike in with the opportunity." + +4. Another thing that completely threw out Christiana's idle visitor and +made her downright angry was the way she would finger and kiss and read +pieces out of the fragrant letter she held in her hand. You will +remember how Christiana came by that letter she was now so fond of. +"Here," said Secret, "is a letter I have brought thee from thy husband's +King." So she took it and opened it, and it smelt after the manner of +the best perfume; also it was written in letters of gold. "I advise +thee," said Secret, "that thou put this letter in thy bosom, that thou +read therein to thy children until you have all got it by root-of-heart." +"His messenger was here," said Christiana to Mrs. Timorous, "and has +brought me a letter which invites me to come." And with that she plucked +out the letter and read to her out of it, and said: "What now do you say +to all that?" That, again, is so true to our own life. For there is +nothing that more distastes and disrelishes many people among us than +just that we should name to them our favourite books, and read a passage +out of them, and ask them to say what they think of such wonderful words. +Samuel Rutherford's _Letters_, for instance; a book that smells to some +nostrils with the same heavenly perfume as Secret's own letter did. A +book, moreover, that is written in the same ink of gold. Ask at +afternoon tea to-morrow, even in so-called Christian homes, when any of +the ladies round the table last read, and how often they have read, +_Grace Abounding, The Saint's Rest, The Religious Affections, Jeremy +Taylor, Law, a Kempis, Fenelon_, or such like, and they will smile to one +another and remark after you are gone on your strange taste for +old-fashioned and long-winded and introspective books. "Julia has buried +her husband and married her daughters, and since that she spends her time +in reading. She is always reading foolish and unedifying books. She +tells you every time she sees you that she is almost at the end of the +silliest book that ever she read in her life. But the best of it is that +it serves to dispose of a good deal of her spare time. She tells you all +romances are sad stuff, yet she is very impatient till she can get all +she can hear of. Histories of intrigue and scandal are the books that +Julia thinks are always too short. The truth is, she lives upon folly +and scandal and impertinence. These things are the support of her dull +hours. And yet she does not see that in all this she is plainly telling +you that she is in a miserable, disordered, reprobate state of mind. Now, +whether you read her books or no, you perhaps think with her that it is a +dull task to read only religious and especially spiritual books. But +when you have the spirit of true religion, when you can think of God as +your only happiness, when you are not afraid of the joys of eternity, you +will think it a dull task to read any other books. When it is the care +of your soul to be humble, holy, pure, and heavenly-minded; when you know +anything of the guilt and misery of sin, or feel a real need of +salvation, then you will find religious and truly spiritual books to be +the greatest feast and joy of your mind and heart." Yes. And then we +shall thank God every day we live that He raised us up such helpers in +our salvation as the gifted and gracious authors we have been speaking +of. + +5. "The further I go the more danger I meet with," said old Timorous, +the father, to Christian, when Christian asked him on the Hill Difficulty +why he was running the wrong way. "I, too, was going to the City of +Zion," he said; "but the further on I go the more danger I meet with." +And, in saying that, the old runaway gave our persevering pilgrim +something to think about for all his days. For, again and again, and +times without number, Christian would have gone back too if only he had +known where to go. Go on, therefore, he must. To go back to him was +simply impossible. Every day he lived he felt the bitter truth of what +that old apostate had so unwittingly said. But, with all that he kept +himself in his onward way till, dangers and difficulties, death and hell +and all, he came to the blessed end of it. And that same has been the +universal experience of all the true and out-and-out saints of God in all +time. If poor old Timorous had only known it, if he had only had some +one beside him to remind him of it, the very thing that so fatally turned +him back was the best proof possible that he was on the right and the +only right way; ay, and fast coming, poor old castaway, to the very city +he had at one time set out to seek. Now, it is only too likely that +there are some of my hearers at this with it to-night, that they are on +the point of giving up the life of faith, and hope, and love, and holy +living; because the deeper they carry that life into their own hearts the +more impossible they find it to live that life there. The more they aim +their hearts at God's law the more they despair of ever coming within +sight of it. My supremely miserable brother! if this is any consolation +to you, if you can take any crumb of consolation out of it, let this be +told you, that, as a matter of fact, all truly holy men have in their +heart of hearts had your very experience. That is no strange and unheard- +of thing which is passing within you. And, indeed, if you could but +believe it, that is one of the surest signs and seals of a true and +genuine child of God. Dante, one of the bravest, but hardest bestead of +God's saints, was, just like you, well-nigh giving up the mountain +altogether when his Greatheart, who was always at his side, divining what +was going on within him, said to him-- + + "Those scars + That when they pain thee most then kindliest heal." + +"The more I do," complained one of Thomas Shepard's best friends to him, +"the worse I am." "The best saints are the most sensible of sin," wrote +Samuel Rutherford. And, again he wrote, "Sin rages far more in the godly +than ever it does in the ungodly." And you dare not deny but that Samuel +Rutherford was one of the holiest men that ever lived, or that in saying +all that he was speaking of himself. And Newman: "Every one who tries to +do God's will"--and that also is Newman himself--"will feel himself to be +full of all imperfection and sin; and the more he succeeds in regulating +his heart, the more will he discern its original bitterness and guilt." +As our own hymn has it: + + "They who fain would serve Thee best + Are conscious most of wrong within." + +Without knowing it, Mrs. Timorous's runaway father was speaking the same +language as the chief of the saints. Only he said, "Therefore I have +turned back," whereas, first Christian, and then Christiana his widow, +said, "Yet I must venture!" + +And so say you. Say, I must and I will venture! Say it; clench your +teeth and your hands and say it. Say that you are determined to go on +towards heaven where the holy are--absolutely determined, though you are +quite well aware that you are carrying up with you the blackest, the +wickedest, the most corrupt, and the most abominable heart either out of +hell or in it. Say that, say all that, and still venture. Say all that +and all the more venture. Venture upon God of whom such reassuring +things are said. Venture upon the Son of God of whom His Father is +represented as saying such inviting things. Venture upon the cross. +Survey the wondrous cross and then make a bold venture upon it. Think +who that is who is bleeding to death upon the cross, and why? Look at +Him till you never afterwards can see anything else. Look at God's +Eternal, Divine, Well-pleasing Son with all the wages of sin dealt out to +Him, body and soul, on that tree to the uttermost farthing. And, devil +incarnate though you indeed are, yet, say, if that spectacle does not +satisfy you, and encourage you, and carry your cowardice captive. +Venture! I say, venture! And if you find at last that you have ventured +too far--if you have sinned and corrupted yourself beyond redemption--then +it will be some consolation and distinction to you in hell that you had +out-sinned the infinite grace of God, and had seen the end of the +unsearchable riches of Christ. Timid sinner, I but mock thee, therefore +venture! Fearful sinner, venture! Cowardly sinner, venture. Venture +thyself upon thy God, upon Christ thy Saviour, and upon His cross. +Venture all thy guilt and all thy corruption taken together upon Christ +hanging upon His cross, and make that tremendous venture now! + + + + +MERCY + + + "Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy."--_Our Lord_. + +The first time that we see Mercy she is standing one sunshine morning +knocking along with another at Christiana's door. And all that we +afterwards hear of Mercy might be described as, A morning call and all +that came of it; or, How a godly matron led on a poor maid to fall in +love with her own salvation. John Bunyan, her biographer, in all his +devotion to Mercy, does not make it at all clear to us why such a sweet +and good girl as Mercy was could be on such intimate terms with Mrs. +Timorous and all her so questionable circle. Could it be that Mercy's +mother was one of that unhappy set? And had this dear little woman-child +been brought up so as to know no better than to figure in their +assemblies, and go out on their morning rounds with Mrs. Light-mind and +Mrs. Know-nothing? Or, was poor Mercy an orphan with no one to watch +over her, and had her sweet face, her handsome figure, and her winning +manners made her one of the attractions of old Madam Wanton's midnight +routs? However it came about, there was Mercy out on a series of morning +calls with a woman twice her age, but a woman whose many years had taught +her neither womanliness nor wisdom. "If you come in God's name, come +in," a voice from the inside answered the knocking of Mrs. Timorous and +Mercy, her companion, at Christiana's door. In all their rounds that +morning the two women had not been met with another salutation like that; +and that strange salutation so disconcerted and so confounded them that +they did not know whether to lift the latch and go in, or to run away and +leave those to go in who could take their delight in such outlandish +language. "If you come in God's name, come in." At this the women were +stunned, for this kind of language they used not to hear or to perceive +to drop from the lips of Christiana. Yet they came in; but, behold, they +found the good woman preparing to be gone from her house. The +conversation that ensued was all carried on by the two elder women. For +it was often remarked about Mercy all her after-days that her voice was +ever soft, and low, and, especially, seldom heard. But her ears were not +idle. For all the time the debate went on--because by this time the +conversation had risen to be a debate--Mercy was taking silent sides with +Christiana and her distress and her intended enterprise, till, when Mrs. +Timorous reviled Christiana and said, "Come away, Mercy, and leave her in +her own hands," Mercy by that time was brought to a standstill. For, +like a rose among thorns, Mercy was thoughtful and wise and womanly far +beyond her years. So much so, that already she had made up her mind to +offer herself as a maidservant to help the widow with her work and to see +her so far on her way, and, indeed, though she kept that to herself, to +go all the way with her, if the way should prove open to her. First, her +heart yearned over Christiana; so she said within herself, If my +neighbour will needs be gone, I will go a little way with her to help +her. Secondly, her heart yearned over her own soul's salvation, for what +Christiana had said had taken some hold upon Mercy's mind. Wherefore she +said within herself, I will yet have more talk with this Christiana, and +if I find truth and life in what she shall say, myself with all my heart +shall also go with her. "Neighbour," spoke out Mercy to Mrs. Timorous, +"I did indeed come with you to see Christiana this morning, and since she +is, as you see, a-taking of her last farewell of her country, I think to +walk this sunshine morning a little way with her to help her on the way." +But she told her not of her second reason, but kept that to herself. I +would fain go on with Mercy's memoirs all night. But you will take up +that inviting thread for yourselves. And meantime I shall stop here and +gather up under two or three heads some of the more memorable results and +lessons of that sunshine-morning call. + +1. Well, then, to begin with, there was something quite queen-like, +something absolutely commanding, about Christiana's look and manner, as +well as about all she said and did that morning. Mercy's morning +companion had all the advantages that dress and equipage could give her; +while Christiana stood in the middle of the floor in her housewife's +clothes, covered with dust and surrounded with all her dismantled house; +but, with all that, there was something about Christiana that took +Mercy's heart completely captive. All that Christiana had by this time +come through had blanched her cheek and whitened her hair: but all that +only the more commanded Mercy's sensitive and noble soul. To be open to +impressions of that kind is one of the finest endowments of a finely +endowed nature; and, all through, the attentive reader of her history +will be sure to remark and imitate Mercy's exquisite and tenacious +sensibility to all that is true and good, upright and honourable and +noble. And then, what a blessing it is to a girl of Mercy's mould to +meet at opening womanhood with another woman, be it a mother, a mistress, +or a neighbour, whose character then, and as life goes on, can supply the +part of the supporting and sheltering oak to the springing and clinging +vine. Christiana being now the new woman she was, as well as a woman of +great natural wisdom, dignity, and stability of character, the safety, +the salvation of poor motherless Mercy was as good as sure. Indeed, all +Mercy's subsequent history is only one long and growing tribute to the +worth, the constant love, and the sleepless solicitude of this true +mother in Israel. + +2. Now, it was so, that, wholly unknown to all her companions, young and +old, in her own very remarkable words, Mercy had for a long time been +hungering with all her heart to meet with some genuinely good +people,--with some people, as she said herself,--"of truth and of life." +These are remarkable words to hear drop from the lips of a young girl, +and especially a girl of Mercy's environment. Now, had there been +anything hollow, had there been one atom of insincerity or exaggeration +about Christiana that morning, had she talked too much, had all her +actions not far more than borne out all her words, had there not been in +the broken-hearted woman a depth of mind and a warmth of heart far beyond +all her words, Mercy would never have become a pilgrim. But the natural +dignity of Christiana's character; her capable, commanding, resolute +ways; the reality, even to agony, of her sorrow for her past life--all +taken together with her iron-fast determination to enter at once on a new +life--all that carried Mercy's heart completely captive. Mercy felt that +there was a solemnity, an awesomeness, and a mystery about her new +friend's experiences and memories that it was not for a child like +herself to attempt to intrude into. But, all the more because of that, a +spell of love and fear and reverence lay on Mercy's heart and mind all +her after-days from that so solemn and so eventful morning when she first +saw Christiana's haggard countenance and heard her remorseful cries. My +so churlish carriages to him! Now, such carriages between man and wife +had often pained and made ashamed Mercy's maidenly heart beyond all +expression. Till she had sometimes said to herself, blushing with shame +before herself as she said it, that if ever she was a wife--may my tongue +cleave to the roof of my mouth before I say one churlish word to him who +is my husband! And thus it was that nothing that Christiana said that +morning in the uprush of her remorse moved Mercy more with pity and with +love than just what Christiana beat her breast about as concerning her +lost husband. Mercy used to say that she saw truth and life enough in +one hour that morning to sober and to solemnise and to warn her to set a +watch on the door of her lips for all her after-days. + +3. Before Mrs. Timorous was well out of the door, Mercy had already +plucked off her gloves, and hung up her morning bonnet on a nail in the +wall, so much did her heart heave to help the cumbered widow and her +fatherless children. "If thou wilt, I will hire thee," said Christiana, +"and thou shalt go with me as my servant. Yet we will have all things +common betwixt thee and me; only, now thou art here, go along with me." +At this Mercy fell on Christiana's neck and kissed her mother; for after +that morning Christiana had always a daughter of her own, and Mercy a +mother. And you may be sure, with two such women working with all their +might, all things were soon ready for their happy departure. + +Mr. Kerr Bain invites his readers to compare John Bunyan's Mercy at this +point with William Law's Miranda. I shall not tarry to draw out the full +comparison here, but shall content myself with simply repeating Mr. +Bain's happy reference. Only, I shall not content myself till all to +whom my voice can reach, and who are able to enjoy only a first-rate +book, have Mr. Bain's book beside their _Pilgrim's Progress_. That +morning, then, on which Mrs. Timorous, having nothing to do at home, set +out with Mercy on a round of calls--that was Mercy's last idle morning +for all her days. For her mind was, ever after that, to be always +busying of herself in doing, for when she had nothing to do for herself +she would be making of hosen and garments for others, and would bestow +them upon those that had need. I will warrant her a good housewife, +quoth Mr. Brisk to himself. So much so that at any place they stopped on +the way, even for a day and a night to rest and refresh themselves, Mercy +would seek out all the poor and all the old people, and ere ever she was +aware what she was doing, already a good report had spread abroad +concerning the pilgrims and their pilgrimage. At the same time, it must +be told that poor Mercy's heart was more heavy for the souls of the poor +people than for their naked bodies and hungry bellies. So much was this +so that when the shepherds, Knowledge, Experience, Watchful, and Sincere, +took her to a place where she saw one Fool and one Want-wit washing of an +Ethiopian with intention to make him white, but the more they washed him +the blacker he was, Mercy blushed and felt guilty before the +shepherds,--she so took home to her charitable heart the bootless work of +Fool and Want-wit. Mercy put on the Salvationist bonnet at her first +outset to the Celestial City, and she never put it off till she came to +that land where there are no more poor to make hosen and hats for, and no +more Ethiopians to take to the fountain. + +4. There are not a few young communicants here to-night, as well as not +a few who are afraid as yet to offer themselves for the Lord's table; +and, as it so falls out to-night, Mercy's case contains both an +encouragement and an example to all such. For never surely had a young +communicant less to go upon than Mercy had that best morning of all her +life. For she had nothing to go upon but a great desire to help +Christiana with her work; some desire for truth and for life; and some +first and feeble yearnings over her own soul,--yearnings, however, that +she kept entirely to herself. That was all. She had no remorses like +those which had ploughed up Christiana's cheeks into such channels of +tears. She had no dark past out of which swarms of hornets stung her +guilty conscience. Nor on the other hand, had she any such sweet dreams +and inviting visions as those that were sent to cheer and encourage the +disconsolate widow. She will have her own sweet dreams yet, that will +make her laugh loud out in her sleep. But that will be long after this, +when she has discovered how hard her heart is and how great God's grace +is. "How shall I be ascertained," she put it to Christiana, "that I also +shall be entertained? Had I but this hope, from one that can tell, I +would make no stick at all, but would go, being helped by Him that can +help, though the way was never so tedious. Had I as good hope for a +loving reception as you have, I think no Slough of Despond would +discourage me." "Well," said the other, "you know your sore, and I know +mine; and, good friend, we shall all have enough evil before we come to +our journey's end." And soon after that, of all places on the upward +way, Mercy's evil began at the Wicket Gate. "I have a companion," said +Christiana, "that stands without. One that is much dejected in her mind, +for that she comes, as she thinks, without sending for; whereas I was +sent to by my husband's King." So the porter opened the gate and looked +out; but Mercy was fallen down in a swoon, for she fainted and was afraid +that the gate would not be opened to her. "O sir," she said, "I am +faint; there is scarce life left in me." But he answered her that one +once said, "When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord, and my +prayer came in into Thee, into Thy holy temple. Fear not, but stand up +upon thy feet, and tell me wherefore thou art come." "I am come, sir, +into that for which I never was invited, as my friend Christiana was. Her +invitation was from the Lord, and mine was but from her. Wherefore, I +fear that I presume." Then said he to those that stood by, "Fetch +something and give it to Mercy to smell on, thereby to stay her +fainting." So they fetched her a bundle of myrrh, and a while after she +revived.--Let young communicants be content with Mercy's invitation. She +started for the City just because she liked to be beside a good woman who +was starting thither. She wished to help a good woman who was going +thither; and just a little desire began at first to awaken in her heart +to go to the city too. Till, having once set her face to go up, one +thing after another worked together to lead her up till she, too, had her +life full of those invitations and experiences and interests and +occupations and enjoyments that make Mercy's name so memorable, and her +happy case such an example and such an inspiration, to all God-fearing +young women especially. + +5. John Bunyan must be held responsible for the strong dash of romance +that he so boldly throws into Mercy's memoirs. But I shall postpone Mr. +Brisk and his love-making and his answer to another lecture. I shall not +enter on Mercy's love matters here at all, but shall leave them to be +read at home by those who like to read romances. Only, since we have +seen so much of Mercy as a maiden, one longs to see how she turned out as +a wife. I can only imagine how Mercy turned out as a wife; but there is +a picture of a Scottish Covenanting girl as a married wife which always +rises up before my mind when I think of Mercy's matronly days. That +picture might hang in Bunyan's own peculiar gallery, so beautiful is the +drawing, and so warm and so eloquent the colouring. Take, then, this +portrait of one of the daughters of the Scottish Covenant. "She was a +woman of great worth, whom I therefore passionately loved and inwardly +honoured. A stately, beautiful, and comely personage; truly pious and +fearing the Lord. Of an evenly temper, patient in our common +tribulations and under her personal distresses. A woman of bright +natural parts, and of an uncommon stock of prudence; of a quick and +lively apprehension in things she applied herself to, and of great +presence of mind in surprising incidents. Sagacious and acute in +discerning the qualities of persons, and therefore not easily imposed +upon. [See Mr. Brisk's interviews with Mercy.] Modest and grave in her +deportment, but naturally cheerful; wise and affable in conversation, +also having a good faculty at speaking and expressing herself with +assurance. Being a pattern of frugality and wise management in household +affairs, all such were therefore entirely committed to her; well fitted +for and careful of the virtuous education of her children; remarkably +useful in the countryside, both in the Merse and in the Forest, through +her skill in physic and surgery, which in many instances a peculiar +blessing appeared to be commanded upon from heaven. And, finally, a +crown to me in my public station and pulpit appearances. During the time +we have lived together we have passed through a sea of trouble, as yet +not seeing the shore but afar off." + +"The words of King Lemuel, the prophecy that his mother taught him. What, +my son? and what, the son of my womb? and what, the son of my vows? Who +can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies. Her +children arise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth +her. Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain; but a woman that feareth +the Lord, she shall be praised." + + + + +MR. BRISK + + + "Be ye not unequally yoked."--_Paul_. + +There were some severe precisians in John Bunyan's day who took the +objection to the author of the _Pilgrim's Progress_ that he sometimes +laughed too loud. + + "One may (I think) say, both he laughs and cries, + May well be guessed at by his watery eyes. + Some things are of that nature as to make + One's fancy chuckle while his heart doth ake. + When Jacob saw his Rachel with the sheep, + At the same time he did both laugh and weep." + +And even Dr. Cheever, in his excellent lectures on the _Pilgrim's +Progress_, confesses that though the Second Part never ceases for a +moment to tell the serious story of the Pilgrimage, at the same time, it +sometimes becomes so merry as almost to pass over into absolute comedy. +"There is one passage," says Cheever, "which for exquisite humour, quiet +satire, and naturalness in the development of character is scarcely +surpassed in the language. It is the account of the courtship between +Mr. Brisk and Mercy which took place at the House Beautiful." + +Now, the insertion of such an episode as that of Mr. Brisk into such a +book as the _Pilgrim's Progress_ is only yet another proof of the health, +the strength, and the truth to nature of John Bunyan's mind. His was +eminently an honest, straightforward, manly, English understanding. A +smaller man would not have ventured on Mr. Brisk in such a book as the +_Pilgrim's Progress_. But there is no affectation, there is no prudery, +there is no superiority to nature in John Bunyan. He knew quite well +that of the thousands of men and women who were reading his _Pilgrim_ +there was no subject, not even religion itself, that was taking up half +so much of their thoughts as just love-making and marriage. And, like +the wise man and the true teacher he was, he here points out to all his +readers how well true religion and the fullest satisfaction of the +warmest and the most universal of human affections can be both harmonised +and made mutually helpful. In Bunyan's day love was too much left to the +playwrights, just as in our day it is too much left to the poets and the +novelists. And thus it is that in too many instances affection and +passion have taken full possession of the hearts and the lives of our +young people before any moral or religious lesson on these all-important +subjects has been given to them: any lesson such as John Bunyan so +winningly and so beautifully gives here. "This incident," says Thomas +Scott, "is very properly introduced, and it is replete with instruction." + +Now, Mr. Brisk, to begin with, was, so we are told, a young man of some +breeding,--that is to say, he was a young man of some social position, +some education, and of a certain good manner, at least on the surface. In +David Scott's Illustrations Mr. Brisk stands before us a handsome and +well-dressed young man of the period, with his well-belted doublet, his +voluminous ruffles, his heavily-studded cuffs, his small cane, his +divided hair, and his delicate hand,--altogether answering excellently to +his name, were it not for the dashed look of surprise with which he gets +his answer, and, with what jauntiness he can at the moment command, takes +his departure. "Mr. Brisk was a man of some breeding," says Bunyan, "and +that pretended to religion; but a man that stuck very close to the +world." That Mr. Brisk made any pretence to religion at any other time +and in any other place is not said; only that he put on that pretence +with his best clothes when he came once or twice or more to Mercy and +offered love to her at the House Beautiful. The man with the least +religion at other times, even the man with no pretence to religion at +other times at all, will pretend to some religion when he is in love with +a young woman of Mercy's mind. And yet it would not be fair to say that +it is all pretence even in such a man at such a time. Grant that a man +is really in love; then, since all love is of the nature of religion, for +the time, the true lover is really on the borders of a truly religious +life. It may with perfect truth be said of all men when they first fall +in love that they are, for the time, not very far away from the kingdom +of heaven. For all love is good, so far as it goes. God is Love; and +all love, in the long-run, has a touch of the divine nature in it. And +for once, if never again, every man who is deeply in love has a far-off +glimpse of the beauty of holiness, and a far-off taste of that ineffable +sweetness of which the satisfied saints of God sing so ecstatically. But, +in too many instances, a young man's love having been kindled only by the +creature, and, never rising from her to his and her Creator, as a rule, +it sooner or later burns low and at last burns out, and leaves nothing +but embers and ashes in his once so ardent heart. Mr. Brisk's +love-making might have ended in his becoming a pilgrim but for this fatal +flaw in his heart, that even in his love-making he stuck so fast to the +world. It is almost incredible: you may well refuse to believe it--that +any young man in love, and especially a young gentleman of Mr. Brisk's +breeding, would approach his mistress with the question how much she +could earn a day. As Mr. Brisk looks at Mercy's lap so full of hats and +hosen and says it, I can see his natty cane beginning to lengthen itself +out in his soft-skinned hand and to send out teeth like a muck-rake. Give +Mr. Brisk another thirty years or so and he will be an ancient churl, +raking to himself the sticks and the straws and the dust of the earth, +neither looking up to nor regarding the celestial crown that is still +offered to him in exchange for his instrument. + +"Now, Mercy was of a fair countenance, and, therefore, all the more +alluring." But her fair countenance was really no temptation to her. +"Sit still, my daughter," said Naomi to Ruth in the Old Testament. And +it was entirely Mercy's maidenly nature to sit still. Even before she +had come to her full womanhood under Christiana's motherly care she would +have been an example to Ruth. Long ago, while Mercy was still a mere +girl, when Mrs. Light-mind said something to her one day that made her +blush, Mercy at last looked up in real anger and said, We women should be +wooed; we were not made to woo. And thus it was that all their time at +the House Beautiful Mercy stayed close at home and worked with her needle +and thread just as if she had been the plainest girl in all the town. "I +might have had husbands afore now," she said, with a cast of her head +over the coat that lay on her lap, "though I spake not of it to any. But +they were such as did not like my conditions, though never did any of +them find fault with my person. So they and I could not agree." Once +Mercy's mouth was opened on the subject of possible husbands it is a +miracle that she did not go on in confidence to name some of the husbands +she might have had. Mercy was too truthful and too honourable a maiden +to have said even on that subject what she did say if it had not been +true. No doubt she believed it true. And the belief so long as she +mentioned no names, did not break any man's bones and did not spoil any +man's market. Don't set up too prudishly and say that it is a pity that +Mercy so far forgot herself as to make her little confidential boast. We +would not have had her without that little boast. Keep-at-home, +sit-still, hats and hosen and all--her little boast only proves Mercy to +have been at heart a true daughter of Eve after all. + +There is an old-fashioned word that comes up again and again in the +account of Mr. Brisk's courtship,--a word that contains far more interest +and instruction for us than might on the surface appear. When Mr. Brisk +was rallied upon his ill-success with Mercy, he was wont to say that +undoubtedly Mistress Mercy was a very pretty lass, only she was troubled +with ill conditions. And then, when Mercy was confiding to Prudence all +about her possible husbands, she said that they were all such as did not +like her conditions. To which Prudence, keeping her countenance, +replied, that the men were but few in their day that could abide the +practice that was set forth by such conditions as those of Mercy. Well, +tossed out Mercy, if nobody will have me I will die a maid, or my +conditions shall be to me as a husband! As I came again and again across +that old seventeenth-century word "conditions," I said to myself, I feel +sure that Dr. Murray of the Oxford Scriptorium will have noted this +striking passage. And on turning up the Sixth Part of the _New English +Dictionary_, there, to be sure, was the old word standing in this present +setting. Five long, rich, closely packed columns stood under the head of +"Condition"; and amid a thousand illustrations of its use, the text: +"1684, Bunyan, Pilgr., ii. 84. He said that Mercy was a pretty lass, but +troubled with ill conditions." Poor illiterate John Bunyan stood in the +centre of a group of learned and famous men, composed of Chaucer, Wyclif, +Skelton, Palsgrave, Raleigh, Featly, Richard Steel, and Walter Scott--all +agreeing in their use of our word, and all supplying examples of its use +in the best English books. By Mercy's conditions, then, is just meant +her cast of mind, her moral nature, her temper and her temperament, her +dispositions and her inclinations, her habits of thought, habits of +heart, habits of life, and so on. + +"Well," said Mercy proudly, "if nobody will have me, I will die a maid, +or my conditions shall be to me as a husband. For I cannot change my +nature, and to have one that lies cross to me in this,--that I purpose +never to admit of as long as I live." By this time, though she is still +little more than a girl, Mercy had her habits formed, her character cast, +and, more than all, her whole heart irrevocably set on her soul's +salvation. And everything--husband and children and all--must condition +themselves to that, else she will have none of them. She had sought +first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and she will seek +nothing, she will accept nothing--no, not even a husband--who crosses her +choice in that. She has chosen her life, and her husband with it. Not +the man as yet, but the whole manner of the man. The conditions of the +man, as she said about herself; else she will boldly and bravely die a +maid. And there are multitudes of married women who, when they read this +page about Mercy, will gnash their teeth at the madness of their youth, +and will wildly wish that they only were maids again; and, then, like +Mercy, they would take good care to make for themselves husbands of their +own conditions too--of their own means, their own dispositions, +inclinations, tastes, and pursuits. For, according as our conditions to +one another are or are not in our marriages, + + "They locally contain or heaven or hell; + There is no third place in them." + +What untold good, then, may all our young women not get out of the loving +study of Mercy's sweet, steadfast, noble character! And what untold +misery may they not escape! From first to last--and we are not yet come +to her last--I most affectionately recommend Mercy to the hearts and +minds of all young women here. Single and married; setting out on +pilgrimage and steadfastly persevering in it; sitting still till the +husband with the right conditions comes, and then rising up with her +warm, well-kept heart to meet him--if any maiden here has no mother, or +no elder sister, or no wise and prudent friend like Prudence or +Christiana to take counsel of--and even if she has--let Mercy be her +meditation and her model through all her maidenly days. + +"Nay, then," said Mercy, "I will look no more on him, for I purpose never +to have a clog to my soul." A pungent resolve for every husband to read +and to think to himself about, who has married a wife with a soul. Let +all husbands who have such wives halt here and ask themselves with some +imagination as to what may sometimes go on, at communion times, say, in +the souls of their wives. It is not every wife, it is true, who has a +soul to clog; but some of our wives have. Well, now, let us ask +ourselves: How do we stand related to their souls? Do our wives, when +examining the state of their souls since they married us, have to say +that at one time they had hoped to be further on in the life of the soul +than they yet are? And are they compelled before God to admit that the +marriage they have made, and would make, has terribly hindered them? +Would they have been better women, would they have been living a better +life, and doing far more good in the world, if they had taken their +maidenly ideals, like Mercy, for a husband? Let us sometimes imagine +ourselves into the secrets of our wives' souls, and ask if they ever feel +that they are unequally and injuriously yoked in their deepest and best +life. Do we ever see a tear falling in secret, or hear a stolen sigh +heaved, or stumble on them at a stealthy prayer? A Roman lady on being +asked why she sometimes let a sob escape her and a tear fall, when she +had such a gentleman of breeding and rank and riches to her husband, +touched her slipper with her finger and said: "Is not that a well-made, a +neat, and a costly shoe? And yet you would not believe how it pinches +and pains me sometimes." + +But some every whit as good women as Mercy was have purposed as nobly and +as firmly as Mercy did, and yet have wakened up, when it was too late, to +find that, with all their high ideals, and with all their prudence, their +husband is not in himself, and is not to them, what they at one time felt +sure he would be. Mercy had a sister named Bountiful, who made that +mistake and that dreadful discovery; and what Mercy had seen of married +life in her sister's house almost absolutely turned her against marriage +altogether. "The one thing certain," says Thomas Mozley in his chapter +on Ideal Wife and Husband, "is that both wife and husband are different +in the result from the expectation. Age, illness, an increasing family, +no family at all, household cares, want of means, isolation, incompatible +prejudices, quarrels, social difficulties, and such like, all tell on +married people, and make them far other than they once promised to be." +When that awakening comes there is only one solace, and women take to +that supreme solace much more often than men. And that solace, as you +all know, is true, if too late, religion. And even where true religion +has already been, there is still a deeper and a more inward religion +suited to the new experiences and the new needs of life. And if both +husband and wife in such a crisis truly betake themselves to Him who +gathereth the solitary into families, the result will be such a +remarriage of depth and tenderness, loyalty and mutual help, as their +early dreams never came within sight of. Not early love, not children, +not plenty of means, not all the best amenities of married life taken +together, will repair a marriage and keep a marriage in repair for one +moment like a living and an intense faith in God; a living and an intense +love to God; and then that faith in and love for one another that spring +out of God and out of His love alone. + + "The tree + Sucks kindlier nurture from a soil enriched + By its own fallen leaves; and man is made, + In heart and spirit, from deciduous hopes + And things that seem to perish." + + + + +MR. SKILL + + + "The vine of Sodom."--_Moses_. + +With infinite delicacy John Bunyan here tells us the sad story of +Matthew's sore sickness at the House Beautiful. The cause of the sore +sickness, its symptoms, its serious nature, and its complete cures are +all told with the utmost plainness; but, at the same time, with the most +exquisite delicacy. Bunyan calls the ancient physician who is summoned +in and who effects the cure, Mr. Skill, but you must believe that Bunyan +himself is Mr. Skill; and I question if this skilful writer ever wrote a +more skilful page than just this page that now lies open before him who +has the eyes to read it. + +Matthew, it must always be remembered, was by this time a young man. He +was the eldest son of Christiana his mother, and for some time now she +had been a sorely burdened widow. Matthew's father was no longer near +his son to watch over him and to warn him against the temptations and the +dangers that wait on opening manhood. And thus his mother, with all her +other cares, had to be both father and mother to her eldest son; and, +with all her good sense and all her long and close acquaintance with the +world, she was too fond a mother to suspect any evil of her eldest son. +And thus it was that Christiana had nearly lost her eldest son before her +eyes were open to the terrible dangers he had for a long time been +running. For it was so, that the upward way that this household without +a head had to travel lay through a land full of all kinds of dangers both +to the bodies and to the souls of such travellers as they were. And what +well-nigh proved a fatal danger to Matthew lay right in his way. It was +Beelzebub's orchard. Not that this young man's way lay through that +orchard exactly; yet, walled up as was that orchard with all its +forbidden fruit, that evil fruit would hang over the wall so that if any +lusty youth wished to taste it, he had only to reach up to the +over-hanging branches and plash down on himself some of the forbidden +bunches. Now, that was just what Matthew had done. Till we have him +lying at the House Beautiful, not only not able to enjoy the delights of +the House and of the season, but so pained in his bowels and so pulled +together with inward pains, that he sometimes cried out as if he were +being torn to pieces. At that moment Mr. Skill, the ancient physician, +entered the sick-room, when, having a little observed Matthew's intense +agony, with a certain mixture of goodness and severity he recited these +professional verses over the trembling bed: + + "O conscience, who can stand against thy power? + Endure thy gripes and agonies one hour? + Stone, gout, strappado, racks, whatever is + Dreadful to sense, are only toys to this-- + No pleasures, riches, honours, friends can tell + How to give ease to this, 'tis like to hell." + +And then, turning to the sick man's mother, who stood at the bed's head +wringing her hands, the ancient leech said to her: "This boy of yours has +been tampering with the forbidden fruit!" At which the angry mother +turned on the well-approved physician as if he had caused all the trouble +that he had come to cure. But the ancient man knew both the son and the +mother too, and therefore he addressed her with some asperity: "I tell +you both that strong measures must be taken instantly, else he will die." +When Mr. Skill had seen that the first purge was too weak, he made him +one to the purpose; and it was made, as he so learnedly said, _ex carne +et sanguine Christi_. The pills were to be taken three at a time, +fasting, in half a quarter of a pint of the tears of repentance. After +some coaxing, such as mothers know best how to use, Matthew took the +medicine and was soon walking about again with a staff, and was able to +go from room to room of the hospitable and happy house. Understandest +thou what thou readest? said Philip the deacon to Queen Candace's +treasurer as he sat down beside him in the chariot and opened up to him +the fifty-third of the prophet Isaiah. And, understandest thou what thou +here readest in Matthew and Mr. Skill? + +1. Now, on this almost too closely veiled case I shall venture to +remark, in the first place, that multitudes of boys grow up into young +men, and go out of our most godly homes and into a whole world of +temptation without due warning being given them as to where they are +going. "I do marvel that none did warn him of it," said Mr. Skill, with +some anger. What Matthew's father might have done in this matter had he +been still in this world when his son became a man in it we can only +guess. As it was, it never entered his mother's too fond mind to take +her fatherless boy by himself when she saw Beelzebub's orchard before +him, and tell him what Solomon told his son, and to point out to him the +prophecy that King Lemuel's mother prophesied to her son. Poor Matthew +was a young man before his mother was aware of it. And, poor woman, she +only found that out when Mr. Skill was in the sick-room and was looking +at her with eyes that seemed to say to her that she had murdered her +child. She had loved too long to look on her first-born as still a +child. When he went at any time for a season out of her sight, she had +never followed him with her knowledge of the world; she had never +prevented him with an awakened and an anxious imagination; till now she +had got him home with no rest in his bones because of his sin. And then +she began to cry too late, O naughty boy, and, O careless mother, what +shall I do for my son! + +2. "That food, to wit, that fruit," said Mr. Skill, "is even the most +hurtful of all. It is the fruit of Beelzebub's orchard." So it is. +There is no fruit that hurts at all like that fruit. How it hurts at the +time, we see in Matthew's sick-room; and how it hurts all a man's after +days we see in Jacob, and in Job, and in David, and in a thousand sin- +sick souls of whose psalms of remorse and repentance the world cannot +contain all the books that should be written. "And yet I marvel," said +the indignant physician, "that none did warn him of it; many have died +thereof." Oh if I could but get the ears of all the sons of godly +fathers and mothers who are beginning to tamper with Beelzebub's orchard- +trees, I feel as if I could warn them to-night, and out of this text, of +what they are doing! I have known so many who have died thereof. Oh if +I could but save them in time from those gripes of conscience that will +pull them to pieces on the softest and the most fragrant bed that shall +ever be made for them on earth! It will be well with them if they do not +lie down torn to pieces on their bed in hell, and curse the day they +first plashed down into their youthful hands the vine of Sodom. Both the +way to hell and the way to heaven are full of many kinds of hurtful +fruits; but that species of fruit that poor misguided Matthew plucked and +ate after he had well passed the gate that is at the head of the way is, +by all men's testimony, by far the most hurtful of all forbidden fruits. + +3. The whole scene in Matthew's sick-room reads, after all, less like a +skilful invention than a real occurrence. Inventive and realistic as +John Bunyan is, there is surely something here that goes beyond even his +genius. After making all allowance for Bunyan's unparalleled powers of +creation and narration, I am inclined to think, the oftener I read it, +that, after all, we have not so much John Bunyan here as very Nature +herself. Yes; John Gifford surely was Mr. Skill. Sister Bosworth surely +was Matthew's mother. And Matthew himself was Sister Bosworth's eldest +son, while one John Bunyan, a travelling tinker, was busy with his +furnaces and his soldering-irons in Dame Bosworth's kitchen. Young +Bunyan, with all his blackguardism, had never plashed down Beelzebub's +orchard. He swears he never did, and we are bound to believe him. But +young Bosworth had been tampering with the forbidden fruit, and Gifford +saw at a glance what was wrong. John Gifford was first an officer in the +Royalist army, then a doctor in Bedford, and now a Baptist Puritan +pastor; and the young tinker looked up to Gifford as the most wonderful +man for learning in books and in bodies and souls of men in all the +world. And when Gifford talked over young Bosworth's bed half to himself +and half to them about a medicine made _ex carne et sanguine Christi_, +the future author of the _Pilgrim's Progress_ never forgot the phrase. At +a glance Gifford saw what was the whole matter with the sick man. And +painful as the truth was to the sick man's mother, and humiliating with a +life-long humiliation to the sick man himself, Gifford was not the man or +the minister to beat about the bush at such a solemn moment. "This boy +has been tampering with that which will kill him unless he gets it taken +off his conscience and out of his heart immediately." Now, this same +divination into our pastoral cases is by far and away the most difficult +part of a minister's work. It is easy and pleasant with a fluent tongue +to get through our pulpit work; but to descend the pulpit stairs and deal +with life, and with this and that sin in the lives of our people,--that +is another matter. "We must labour," says Richard Baxter in his +_Reformed Pastor_, "to be acquainted with the state of all our people as +fully as we can; both to know the persons and their inclinations and +conversation; to know what sins they are most in danger of, what duties +they neglect, and what temptations they are most liable to. For, if we +know not their temperament or their disease, we are likely to prove but +unsuccessful physicians." But when we begin to reform our pastorate to +that pattern, we are soon compelled to set down such entries in our +secret diary as that of Thomas Shepard of Harvard University: "Sabbath, +5th April 1641. Nothing I do, nay, none under my shadow prosper. I so +want wisdom for my place, and to guide others." Yes; for what wisdom is +needed for the place of a minister like John Gifford, John Bunyan, +Richard Baxter, and Thomas Shepard! What wisdom, what divine genius, to +dive into and divine the secret history of a soul from a twinge of +conscience, even from a drop of the eye, a tone of the voice, or a +gesture of the hand or of the head! And yet, with some natural taste for +the holy work, with study, with experience, and with life-long expert +reading, even a plain minister with no genius, but with some grace and +truth, may come to great eminence in the matters of the soul. And then, +with what an interest, solemn and awful, with what a sleepless interest +such a pastor goes about among his diseased, sin-torn, and scattered +flock! All their souls are naked and open under his divining eye. They +need not to tell him where they ail, and of what sickness they are nigh +unto death. That food, he says, with some sternness over their sick-bed, +I warned you of it; I told you with all plainness that many have died of +eating that fruit! "We must be ready," Baxter continues, "to give advice +to those that come to us with cases of conscience. A minister is not +only for public preaching, but to be a known counsellor for his people's +souls as the lawyer is for their estates, and the physician is for their +bodies. And because the people are grown unacquainted with this office +of the ministry, and their own necessity and duty herein, it belongeth to +us to acquaint them herewith, and to press them publicly to come to us +for advice concerning their souls. We must not only be willing of the +trouble, but draw it upon ourselves by inviting them hereto. To this end +it is very necessary to be acquainted with practical cases and able to +assist them in trying their states. One word of seasonable and prudent +advice hath done that good that many sermons would not have done." + +4. As he went on pounding and preparing his well-approved pill, the (at +the bottom of his heart) kind old leech talked encouragingly to the +mother and to her sick son, and said: "Come, come; after all, do not he +too much cast down. Had we lived in the days of the old medicine, I +would have been compounding a purge out of the blood of a goat, and the +ashes of an heifer, and the juice of hyssop. But I have a far better +medicine under my hands here. This moment I will make you a purge to the +purpose." And then the learned man, half-doctor, half-divine, chanted +again the sacred incantation as he bent over his pestle and mortar, +saying: _Ex carne et sanguine Christi_! Those shrewd old eyes soon saw +that, in spite of all their defences and all their denials, damage had +been done to the conscience and the heart that nothing would set right +but a frank admission of the evil that had been done, and a prompt +submission to the regimen appointed and the medicine prepared. And how +often we ministers puddle and peddle with goat's blood and heifer's ashes +and hyssop juice when we should instantly prescribe stern fasting and +secret prayer and long spaces of repentance, and then the body and the +blood of Christ. How often our people cheat us into healing their hurt +slightly! How often they succeed in putting us off, after we are called +in, with their own account of their cases, and set us out on a wild-goose +chase! I myself have more than once presented young men in their trouble +with apologetic books, University sermons, and watered-down explanations +of the Confession and the Catechism, when, had I known all I came +afterwards to know, I would have sent them Bunyan's _Sighs from Hell_. I +have sent soul-sick women also _The Bruised Reed_, and _The Mission of +the Comforter_ with sympathising inscriptions, and sweet scriptures +written inside, when, had I had Mr. Skill's keen eyes in my stupid head, +I would have gone to them with the total abstinence pledge in my one +hand, and Jeremy Taylor's _Holy Living and Dying_ in my other. "No diet +but that which is wholesome!" almost in anger answered the sick man's +mother. "I tell you," the honest leech replied, in more anger, "this boy +has been tampering with Beelzebub's orchard. And many have died of it!" + +5. It was while all the rest of the House Beautiful were supping on lamb +and wine, and while there was such music in the House that made Mercy +exclaim over it with wonder--it was at the smell of the supper and at the +sound of the psalmody that Matthew's gripes seized upon him worse than +ever. All the time the others sat late into the night Matthew lay on the +rack pulled to pieces. After William Law's death at King's Cliffe, his +executors found among his most secret papers a prayer he had composed for +his own alone use on a certain communion day when he was self-debarred +from the Lord's table. I do not know for certain just what fruit the +young non-juror had stolen out of Beelzebub's orchard before that +communion season; but I can see that he was in poor Matthew's exact +experience that communion night,--literally torn to pieces with agonies +of conscience while all his fellow-worshippers were at the table of the +Lord. While the psalms and hymns are being sung at the supper-table, lay +your ear to Law's closet door. "Whilst all Thy faithful servants are on +this day offering to Thee the comfortable sacrifice of the body and the +blood of Christ, and feasting at that holy table which Thou hast ordained +for the refreshment, joy, and comfort of their souls, I, unhappy wretch, +full of guilt, am justly denied any share of these comforts that are +common to the Christian world. O my God, I am an unclean worm, a dead +dog, a stinking carcass, justly removed from that society of saints who +this day kneel about Thine altar. But, oh! suffer me to look toward Thy +holy Sanctuary; suffer my soul again to be in the place where Thine +honour dwelleth. Reject not the sacrifice of a broken heart, and do Thou +be with me in secret, though I am not fit to appear in Thy public +worship. Lord, if Thou wilt Thou canst make me clean. Lord, speak but +the word, and Thy servant shall be healed." It is the fruit of +Beelzebub's orchard. Many have died thereof. + +6. "Pray, sir, make me up twelve boxes of them; for if I can get these, +I will never take other physic." "These same pills," he replied, "are +good also to prevent diseases as well as to cure when one is sick. But, +good woman, thou must take these pills no other way but as I have +prescribed; for if you do, they will do no good." I have taken one +illustration from William Law's life; I shall take another from that +world of such illustrations and so close. "O God, let me never see such +another day as this. Let the dreadful punishment of this day never be +out of my mind." And it never was. For, after that day in hell, Law +never laid down his head on his pillow that he did not seem to remember +that dreadful day. William Law would have satisfied Dr. Skill for a +convalescent. For he never felt that he had any right to touch the body +and blood of Christ, either at communion times, or a thousand times every +day, till he had again got ready his heart of true repentance. My +brethren, self-destroyed out of Beelzebub's orchard, and all my brethren, +live a life henceforth of true repentance. Not out of the sins of your +youth only, but out of the best, the most watchful, and the most +blameless day you ever live, distil your half-pint of repentance every +night before you sleep. For, as dear old Skill said, unless you do, +neither flesh nor blood of Christ, nor anything else, will do you any +genuine good. + + + + +THE SHEPHERD BOY + + + "He humbled Himself."--_Paul_. + +"Now as they were going along and talking, they espied a boy feeding his +father's sheep. The boy was in very mean clothes, but of a very fresh +and well-favoured countenance, and as he sat by himself he sang. Hark, +said Mr. Greatheart, to what the shepherd boy saith. So they hearkened +and he said: + + He that is down, needs fear no fall; + He that is low no pride: + He that is humble, ever shall + Have God to be his guide. + + I am content with what I have, + Little be it or much: + And, Lord, contentment still I crave, + Because thou savest such. + + Fulness to such a burden is + That go on pilgrimage: + Here little, and hereafter bliss, + Is best from age to age. + +Then said their guide, Do you hear him? I will dare say that this boy +lives a merrier life and wears more of that herb called Heart's-ease in +his bosom than he that is clad in silk and velvet." + +Now, notwithstanding all that, nobody knew better than John Bunyan knew, +that no shepherd boy that ever lived on the face of the earth ever sang +that song; only one Boy ever sang that song, and He was not the son of a +shepherd at all, but the son of a carpenter. And, saying that leads me +on to say this before I begin, that I look for a man of John Bunyan's +inventive and sanctified genius to arise some day, and armed also to boot +with all our latest and best New Testament studies. When that sorely- +needed man so arises he will take us back to Nazareth where that +carpenter's Boy was brought up, and he will let us see Him with our own +eyes being brought up. He will lead us into Mary's house on Sabbath +days, and into Joseph's workshop on week days, and he will show us the +child Jesus, not so much learning His letters and then putting on His +carpenter's clothes, as learning obedience by the things that He every +day suffered. That choice author will show us our Lord, both before He +had discovered Himself to be our Lord, as well as after He had made that +great discovery, always clothing Himself with humility as with a garment; +taking up His yoke of meekness and lowly-mindedness every day, and never +for one moment laying it down. When some writer with as holy an +imagination as that of John Bunyan, and with as sweet an English style, +and with a New Testament scholarship of the first order so arises, and so +addresses himself to the inward life of our Lord, what a blessing to our +children that writer will be! For he will make them see and feel just +what all that was in which our Lord's perfect humility consisted, and how +His perfect humility fulfilled itself in Him from day to day; up through +all His childhood days, school and synagogue days, workshop and holy +days, early manhood and mature manhood days; till He was so meek in all +His heart and so humble in all His mind that all men were sent to Him to +learn their meekness and their humility of Him. I envy that gifted man +the deep delight he will have in his work, and the splendid reward he +will have in the love and the debt of all coming generations. Only, may +he be really sent to us, and that soon! Theodor Keim comes nearest a far- +off glimpse of that eminent service of any New Testament scholar I know. +Jeremy Taylor and Thomas Goodwin also, in their own time and in their own +way, had occasional inspirations toward this still-waiting treatment of +the master-subject of all learning and all genius--the inward +sanctification, the growth in grace, and then the self-discovery of the +incarnate Son of God. But, so let it please God, some contemporary +scholar will arise some day soon, combining in himself Goodwin's +incomparable Christology, and Taylor's incomparable eloquence, and Keim's +incomparably digested learning, with John Bunyan's incomparable +imagination and incomparable English style, and the waiting work will be +done, and theology for this life will take on its copestone. In his +absence, and till he comes, let us attempt a few annotations to-night on +this so-called shepherd boy's song in the Valley of Humiliation. + + He that is down, needs fear no fall. + +The whole scenery of the surrounding valley is set before us in that +single eloquent stanza. The sweet-voiced boy sits well off the wayside +as he sings his song to himself. He looks up to the hill-tops that hang +over his valley, and every shining tooth of those many hill-tops has for +him its own evil legend. He thinks he sees a little heap of bleaching +bones just under where that eagle hangs and wheels and screams. Not one +traveller through these perilous parts in a thousand gets down those +cruel rocks unhurt; and many travellers have been irrecoverably lost +among those deadly rocks, and have never received Christian burial. All +the shepherds' cottages and all the hostel supper-tables for many miles +round are full of terrible stories of the Hill Difficulty and the Descent +Dangerous. And thus it is that this shepherd boy looks up with such fear +at those sharp peaks and shining precipices, and lifts his fresh and well- +favoured countenance to heaven and sings again: "He that is down, needs +fear no fall." Down in his own esteem, that is. For this is a song of +the heart rather than of the highway. Down--safe, that is, from the +steep and slippery places of self-estimation, self-exaltation, +self-satisfaction. Down--so as to be delivered from all ambition and +emulation and envy. Down, and safe, thank God, from all pride, all high- +mindedness, and all stout-heartedness. Down from the hard and cruel +hills, and buried deep out of sight among those meadows where that herb +grows which is called Heart's-ease. Down, where the green pastures grow +and the quiet waters flow. No, indeed; he that is down into this sweet +bottom needs fear no fall. For there is nowhere here for a man to fall +from. And, even if he did fall, he would only fall upon a +fragrance-breathing bed of lilies. The very herbs and flowers here would +conspire to hold him up. Many a day, as He grew up, the carpenter's son +sat in that same valley and sang that same song to His own humble and +happy heart. He loved much to be here. He loved also to walk these +meadows, for He found the air was pleasant. Methinks, He often said with +Mercy, I am as well in this valley as I have been anywhere else in My +journey. The place, methinks, suits with My spirit. I love to be in +such places where there is no rattling with coaches nor rumbling with +wheels. Methinks, also, here one may without much molestation be +thinking what he is, whence he came, and to what his King has called him. + + He that is low, no pride. + +Low in his own eyes, that is. For pride goeth before destruction, and a +haughty spirit before a fall. Yes; but he who is low enough already--none +of the sure destructions that pride always works shall ever come near to +him. "The proud man," says Sir Henry Taylor, "is of all men the most +vulnerable. 'Who calls?' asks the old shepherd in _As You Like It_. +'Your betters,' is the insolent answer. And what is the shepherd's +rejoinder? 'Else are they very wretched.' By what retort, reprisal, or +repartee could it have been made half so manifest that the insult had +lighted upon armour of proof? Such is the invincible independence and +invulnerability of humility." + + He that is humble ever shall + Have God to be his guide. + +For thus saith the high and holy One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name +is Holy: I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a +contrite and humble spirit, to revive the heart of the humble, and to +revive the heart of the contrite ones . . . All those things hath Mine +hand made, but to this man will I look, saith the Lord, even to him that +is poor and of a contrite spirit, and who trembleth at My word . . . +Though the Lord be high, yet hath He respect unto the lowly; but the +proud He knoweth afar off . . . Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves +unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be +clothed with humility; for God resisteth the proud and giveth grace to +the humble . . . Lord, my heart is not haughty, nor mine eyes lofty, +neither do I exercise myself in great matters, or in things too high for +me. Surely I have behaved and quieted myself, as a child that is weaned +of his mother: my soul is even as a weaned child . . . Take My yoke upon +you and learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find +rest unto your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light. + + I am content with what I have, + Little be it, or much: + And, Lord, contentment still I crave, + Because thou savest such. + +The only thing this sweet singer is discontented with is his own +contentment. He will not be content as long as he has a shadow of +discontent left in his heart. And how blessed is such holy discontent! +For, would you know, asks Law, who is the greatest saint in all the +world? Well, it is not he who prays most or fasts most; it is not he who +gives most alms or is most eminent for temperance, chastity, or justice. +But it is he who is always thankful to God, who wills everything that God +willeth, who receives everything as an instance of God's goodness, and +has a heart always ready to praise God for it. "Perhaps the shepherd's +boy," says Thomas Scott, "may refer to the obscure and quiet stations of +some pastors over small congregations, who live almost unknown to their +brethren, but are in a measure useful and very comfortable." Perhaps he +does. And, whether he does or no, at any rate such a song will suit some +of our brethren very well as they go about among their few and far-off +flocks. They are not church leaders or popular preachers. There is not +much rattling with coaches or rumbling with wheels at their church door. +But, then, methinks, they have their compensation. They are without much +molestation. They can be all the more thinking what they are, whence +they came, and to what their King has called them. Let them be happy in +their shut-in valleys. For I will dare to say that they wear more of +that herb called Heart's-ease in their bosom than those ministers do they +are sometimes tempted to emulate. I will add in this place that to the +men who live and trace these grounds the Lord hath left a yearly revenue +to be faithfully paid them at certain seasons for their maintenance by +the way, and for their further encouragement to go on in their +pilgrimage. + + Here little, and hereafter bliss, + Is best from age to age. + +But, now, from the shepherd boy and from his valley and his song, let us +go on without any more poetry or parable to look our own selves full in +the face and to ask our own hearts whether they are the hearts of really +humble-minded and New Testament men or no. Dr. Newman, "that subtle, +devout man," as Dr. Duncan calls him, says that "humility is one of the +most difficult of virtues both to attain and to ascertain. It lies," he +says, "close upon the heart itself, and its tests are exceedingly +delicate and subtle. Its counterfeits abound." Most true. And yet +humility is not intended for experts in morals only, or for men of a rare +religious genius only. The plainest of men, the least skilled and the +most unlettered of men, may not only excel in humility, but may also be +permitted to know that they are indeed planted, and are growing slowly +but surely in that grace of all graces. No doubt our Lord had, so to +describe it, the most delicate and the most subtle of human minds; and, +no doubt whatever, He had the most practised skill in reading off what +lay closest to His own heart. And, then, it was just His attainment of +the most perfect humility, and then His absolute ascertainment of the +same, that enabled Him to say: Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me. At +the same time, divine as the grace is, and divine as the insight is that +is able to trace it out in all its exquisite refinements of thought and +feeling in the sanctified soul, yet humility is a human virtue after all, +and it is open to all men to attain to it and intelligently and lovingly +to exercise it. The simplest and the least philosophical soul now in +this house may apply to himself some of the subtlest and most sensitive +tests of humility, as much as if he were Dr. Duncan or Dr. Newman +themselves; and may thus with all assurance of hope know whether he is a +counterfeit and a castaway or no. + +Take this test for one, then. Explain this text to me: Phil. ii. 3--"In +lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than himself." Explain +and illustrate that. Not from a commentary, but straight out from your +own heart. What does your heart make of that scripture? Does your heart +turn away from that scripture almost in anger at it? Do you say you are +certain that there must be some other explanation of it than that? Do +you hold that this is just another of Paul's perpetual hyperboles, and +that the New Testament is the last book in the world to be taken as it +reads? Yes; both bold and subtle father that he is: counterfeits abound! + +Another much blunter test, but, perhaps, a sufficiently sharp test, is +this: How do you receive correction and instruction? Does your heart +meekly and spontaneously and naturally take to correction and instruction +as the most natural and proper thing possible to you? And do you +immediately, and before all men, show forth and exhibit the correction +and the instruction? Or, does this rather take place? Does your heart +beat, and swell, and boil, and boil over at him who dares to correct or +counsel you? If this is a fair test to put our humility to, how little +humility there is among us! How few men any of us could name among our +friends to whom we would risk telling all the things that behind their +backs we point out continually to others? We are terrified to face their +pride. We once did it, and we are not to do it again, if we can help it! +Let a man not have too many irons in the fire; let him examine himself +just by these two tests for the time--what he thinks of himself, and what +he thinks of those who attempt, and especially before other people, to +set him right. And after these two tests have been satisfied, others +will no doubt be supplied till that so humble man is made very humility +itself. + +And now, in the hope that there may be one or two men here who are really +and not counterfeitly in earnest to clothe themselves with humility +before God and man, let them take these two looms to themselves out of +which whole webs of such garments will be delivered to them every +day--their past life, and their present heart. With a past life like +ours, my brethren--and everyman knows his own--pride is surely the +maddest state of mind that any of us can allow ourselves in. The first +king of Bohemia kept his clouted old shoes ever in his sight, that he +might never forget that he had once been a ploughman. And another wise +king used to drink out of a coarse cup at table, and excused himself to +his guests that he had made the rude thing in his rude potter days. Look +with Primislaus and Agathocles at the hole of the pit out of which you +also have been dug; look often enough, deep enough, and long enough, and +you will be found passing up through the Valley of Humiliation singing: + + "With us He dealt not as we sinn'd, + Nor did requite our ill!" + +Another excellent use of the past is, if you are equal to it, to call +yourself aloud sometimes, or in writing, some of the names that other +people who know your past are certainly calling you. It is a terrible +discipline, but it is the terror of the Lord, and He will not let it hurt +you too much. I was before a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and +injurious, says Paul. And, to show Titus, his gospel-son, the way, he +said to him: We ourselves were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, +serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, +and hating one another. And John Bunyan calls himself a blackguard, and +many other worse names; only he swears that neither with his soldiering +nor with his tinkering hands did he ever plash down Beelzebub's orchard. +But if you have done that, or anything like that, call yourself aloud by +your true name on your knees to-night. William Law testifies, after five- +and-twenty years' experience of it, that he never heard of any harm that +he had done to any in his house by his habit of singing his secret psalms +aloud, and sometimes, ere ever he was aware, bursting out in his +penitential prayers. + +And, then, how any man with a man's heart in his bosom for a single day +can escape being the chief of sinners, and consequently the humblest of +men for all the rest of his life on earth, passes my comprehension! How +a spark of pride can live in such a hell as every human heart is would be +past belief, did we not know that God avenges sin by more sin; avenges +Himself on a wicked and a false heart by more wickedness and more +falsehood, all ending in Satanic pride. + +Too long as I have kept you in this valley to-night, I dare not let you +out of it till I have shared with you a few sentences on evangelical +humiliation out of that other so subtle and devout man, Jonathan Edwards. +But what special kind of humiliation is evangelical humiliation? you will +ask. Hear, then, what this master in Israel says. "Evangelical +humiliation is the sense that a Christian man has of his own utter +insufficiency, utter despicableness, and utter odiousness; with an always +answerable frame of heart. This humiliation is peculiar to the true +saints. It arises from the special influence of the Spirit of God +implanting and exercising supernatural and divine principles; and it is +accompanied with a sense of the transcendent beauty of divine things. +And, thus, God's true saints all more or less see their own odiousness on +account of sin, and the exceedingly hateful nature of all sin. The very +essence of evangelical humiliation consists in such humility as becomes a +man in himself exceeding sinful but now under a dispensation of grace. It +consists in a mean esteem of himself, as in himself nothing, and +altogether contemptible and odious. This, indeed, is the greatest and +the most essential thing in true religion." And so on through a whole +chapter of beaten gold. To which noble chapter I shall only add that +such teaching is as sweet, as strengthening, and as reassuring to the +truly Christian heart as it is bitter and hateful to the counterfeit +heart. + + + + +OLD HONEST + + + "An honest heart."--_Our Lord_. + + Next tell them of Old Honest, who you found + With his white hairs treading the pilgrim's ground; + Yea, tell them how plain-hearted this man was, + How after his good Lord he bare his cross: + Perhaps with some grey head this may prevail, + With Christ to fall in love, and sin bewail. + +You would have said that no pilgrim to the Celestial City could possibly +have come from a worse place, or a more unlikely place, than was that +place from which Christian and Christiana and Matthew and Mercy had come. +And yet so it was. For Old Honest, this most excellent and every way +most delightful old saint, hailed from a far less likely place than even +the City of Destruction. For he came, this rare old soul, of all places +in the world, from the Town of Stupidity. So he tells us himself. And, +partly to explain to us the humiliating name of his native town, and +partly to exhibit himself as a wonder to many, the frank old gentleman +goes on to tell us that his birthplace actually lies four degrees further +away from the sun than does the far-enough away City of Destruction +itself. So that you see this grey-haired saint is all that he always +said he was--a living witness to the fact that his Lord is able to save +to the uttermost, and to gather in His Father's elect from the utmost +corner of the land. Men are mountains of ice in my country, said Old +Honest. I was one of the biggest of those icebergs myself, he said. No +man was ever more cold and senseless to divine things than I was, and +still sometimes am. It takes the Sun of Righteousness all His might to +melt the men of my country. But that He can do it when He rises to do +it, and when He puts out His full strength to do it--Look at me! said the +genial old soul. + +We have to construct this pilgrim's birth and boyhood and youth from his +after-character and conversation; and we have no difficulty at all in +doing that. For, if the child is the father of the man, then the man +must be the outcome of the child, and we can have no hesitation in +picturing to ourselves what kind of child and boy and young man dear Old +Honest must always have been. He never was a bright child, bright and +beaming old man as he is. He was always slow and heavy at his lessons; +indeed, I would not like to repeat to you all the bad names that his +schoolmasters sometimes in their impatience called the stupid child. +Only, this was to be said of him, that dulness of uptake and +disappointment of his teachers were the worst things about this poor boy; +he was not so ill-behaved as many were who were made more of. When his +wits began to waken up after he had come some length he had no little +leeway to make up in his learning; but that was the chief drawback to Old +Honest's pilgrimage. For one thing, no young man had a cleaner record +behind him than our Honest had; his youthful garments were as unspotted +as ever any pilgrim's garments were. Even as a young man he had had the +good sense to keep company with one Good-conscience; and that friend of +his youth kept true to Old Honest all his days, and even lent him his +hand and helped him over the river at last. In his own manly, hearty, +blunt, breezy, cheery, and genial way Old Honest is a pilgrim we could +ill have spared. Old Honest has a warm place all for himself in every +good and honest heart. + +"Now, a little before the pilgrims stood an oak, and under it when they +came up to it they found an old pilgrim fast asleep; they knew that he +was a pilgrim by his clothes and his staff and his girdle. So the guide, +Mr. Greatheart, awaked him, and the old gentleman, as he lifted up his +eyes, cried out: What's the matter? Who are you? And what is your +business here? Come, man, said the guide, be not so hot; here is none +but friends! Yet the old man gets up and stands upon his guard, and will +know of them what they are." That weather-beaten oak-tree under which we +first meet with Old Honest is an excellent emblem of the man. When he +sat down to rest his old bones that day he did not look out for a bank of +soft moss or for a bed of fragrant roses; that knotted oak-tree alone had +power to draw down under its sturdy trunk this heart of human oak. It +was a sight to see those thin grey haffets making a soft pillow of that +jutting knee of gnarled and knotty oak, and with his well-worn +quarterstaff held close in a hand all wrinkled skin and scraggy bone. And +from that day till he waved his quarterstaff when half over the river and +shouted, Grace reigns! there is no pilgrim of them all that affords us +half the good humour, sagacity, continual entertainment, and brave +encouragement we enjoy through this same old Christian gentleman. + +1. Now, let us try to learn two or three lessons to-night from Old +Honest, his history, his character, and his conversation. And, to begin +with, let all those attend to Old Honest who are slow in the uptake in +the things of religion. O fools and slow of heart! exclaimed our Lord at +the two travellers to Emmaus. And this was Old Honest to the letter when +he first entered on the pilgrimage life; he was slow as sloth itself in +the things of the soul. I have often wondered, said Greatheart, that any +should come from your place; for your town is worse than is the City of +Destruction itself. Yes, answered Honest, we lie more off from the sun, +and so are more cold and senseless. And his biographer here annotates on +the margin this reflection: "Stupefied ones are worse than merely +carnal." So they are; though it takes some insight to see that, and some +courage to carry that through. Now, to be downright stupid in a man's +natural intellects is sad enough, but to be stupid in the intellects of +the soul and of the spirit is far more sad. You will often see this if +you have any eyes in your head, and are not one of the stupid people +yourself. You will see very clever people in the intellects of the head +who are yet as stupid as the beasts in the stall in the far nobler +intellects of the heart. You will meet every day with men and women who +have received the best college education this city can give them, who are +yet stark stupid in everything that belongs to true religion. They are +quick to find out the inefficiency of a university chair, or a +schoolmaster's desk, but they know no more of what a New Testament pulpit +has been set up for than the stupidest sot in the city. The Divine +Nature, human nature, sin, grace, redemption, salvation, holiness, heart- +corruption, spiritual life, prayer, communion with God, a conversation +and a treasure in heaven,--to all these noblest of studies and divinest +of exercises they are as a beast before God. When you come upon a man +who is a sot in his senses and in his understanding, you expect him to be +the same in his spiritual life. But to meet with an expert in science, a +classical scholar, an author or a critic in letters, a leader in +political or ecclesiastical or municipal life, and yet to discover that +he is as stupid as any sot in the things of his own soul, is one of the +saddest and most disheartening sights you can see. Much sadder and much +more disheartening than to see stairs and streets of people who can +neither read nor write. And yet our city is full of such stupid people. +You will find as utter spiritual stupidity among the rich and the +lettered and the refined of this city as you will find among the ignorant +and the vicious and the criminal classes. Is stupidity a sin? asks +Thomas in his Forty-Sixth Question. And the great schoolman answers +himself, "Stupidity may come of natural incapacity, in which case it is +not a sin. But it may come, on the other hand, of a man immersing his +soul in the things of this world so as to shut out all the things of God +and of the world to come, in which case stupidity is a deadly sin." Now, +from all that, you must already see what you are to do in order to escape +from your inborn and superinduced stupidity. You are, like Old Honest, +to open your gross, cold, senseless heart to the Sun of Righteousness, +and you are to take care every day to walk abroad under His beams. You +are to emigrate south for your life, as our well-to-do invalids do, to +where the sun shines in his strength all the day. You are to choose such +a minister, buy and read such a literature, cultivate such an +acquaintanceship, and follow out such a new life of habits and practices +as shall bring you into the full sunshine, till your heart of ice is +melted, and your stupefied soul is filled with spiritual sensibility. +For, "were a man a mountain of ice," said Old Honest, "yet if the Sun of +Righteousness will arise upon him his frozen heart shall feel a thaw; and +thus hath it been with me." Your poets and your philosophers have no +resource against the stupidity that opposes them. "Even the gods," they +complain, "fight unvictorious against stupidity." But your divines and +your preachers have hope beside the dullest and the stupidest and even +the most imbruted. They point themselves and their slowest and dullest- +witted hearers to Old Honest, this rare old saint; and they set up their +pulpit with hope and boldness on the very causeway of the town of +Stupidity itself. + +2. In the second place,--on this fine old pilgrim's birth and boyhood +and youth. The apostle says that there is no real difference between one +of us and another; and what he says on that subject must be true. No; +there is really no difference compared with the Celestial City whether a +pilgrim is born in Stupidity, in Destruction, in Vanity, or in Darkland. +At the same time, nature, as well as grace, is of God, and He maketh, +when it pleaseth Him, one man to differ in some most important respects +from another. You see such differences every day. Some children are +naturally, and from their very infancy, false and cruel, mean and greedy; +while their brothers and sisters are open and frank and generous. One +son in a house is born a vulgar snob, and one daughter a shallow-hearted +and shameless little flirt; while another brother is a born gentleman, +and another sister a born saint. Some children are tender-hearted, +easily melted, and easily moulded; while others in the same family are +hard as stone and cold as ice. Sometimes a noble and a truly Christian +father will have all his days to weep and pray over a son who is his +shame; and then, in the next generation, a grandson will be born to him +who will more than recover the lost image of his father's father. And so +is it sometimes with father Adam's family. Here and there, in Darkland, +in Destruction, and in Stupidity, a child will be born with a surprising +likeness to the first Adam in his first estate. That happy child at his +best is but the relics and ruins of his first father; at the same time, +in him the relics are more abundant and the ruins more easy to trace out. +And little Honest was such a well-born child. For, Stupidity and all, +there was a real inborn and inbred integrity, uprightness, +straightforwardness, and nobleness about this little and not over-clever +man-child. And, on the principle of "to him that hath shall be given," +there was something like a special providence that hedged this boy about +from the beginning. "I girded thee though thou hast not known Me" was +never out of Old Honest's mouth as often as he remembered the days of his +own youth and heard other pilgrims mourning over theirs. "I have +surnamed thee though thou hast not known Me," he would say to himself in +his sleep. Slow-witted as he was, no one had been able to cheat young +Honest out of his youthful integrity. He had not been led, and he had +led no one else, into the paths of the destroyer. He could say about +himself all that John Bunyan so boldly and so bluntly said about himself +when his enemies charged him with youthful immorality. He left the town +in nobody's debt. He left the print of his heels on no man or woman or +child when he took his staff in his hand to be a pilgrim. The upward +walk of too many pilgrims is less a walk than an escape and a flight. The +avenger of men's blood and women's honour has hunted many men deep into +heaven's innermost gate. But Old Honest took his time. He walked, if +ever pilgrim walked, all the way with an easy mind. He lay down to sleep +under the oaks on the wayside, and smiled like a child in his sleep. And, +when he was suddenly awaked, instead of crying out for mercy and starting +to his heels, he grasped his staff and demanded even of an armed man what +business he had to break in on an honest pilgrim's midday repose! The +King of the Celestial City had a few names even in Stupidity which had +not defiled their garments, and Old Honest was one of them. And all his +days his strength was as the strength of ten, because his heart was pure. + +3. At the same time, honesty is not holiness; and no one knew that +better than did this honest old saint. When any one spoke to Old Honest +about his blameless youth, the look in his eye made them keep at arm's- +length as he growled out that without holiness no man shall see God! +Writing from Aberdeen to John Bell of Hentoun, Samuel Rutherford says: "I +beseech you, in the Lord Jesus, to mind your country above; and now, when +old age is come upon you, advise with Christ before you put your foot +into the last ship and turn your back on this life. Many are beguiled +with this that they are free of scandalous sins. But common honesty will +not take men to heaven. Alas! that men should think that ever they met +with Christ who had never a sick night or a sore heart for sin. I have +known a man turn a key in a door and lock it by." "I can," says John +Owen, "and I do, commend moral virtues and honesty as much as any man +ought to do, and I am sure there is no grace where they are not. Yet to +make anything to be our holiness that is not derived from Jesus Christ,--I +know not what I do more abhor." "Are morally honest and sober men +qualified for the Lord's Supper?" asks John Flavel. "No; civility and +morality do not make a man a worthy communicant. They are not the +wedding garment; but regenerating grace and faith in the smallest measure +are." "My outside may be honest," said this honest old pilgrim, "while +all the time my heart is most unholy. My life is open to all men, but I +must hide my heart with Christ in God." + +4. And then this racy-hearted old bachelor was as full of delight in +children, and in children's parties, with all their sweetmeats and nuts +and games and riddles,--quite as much so--as if he had been their very +grandfather himself. Nay, this rosy-hearted old rogue was as inveterate +a matchmaker as if he had been a mother of the world with a houseful of +daughters on her hands and with the sons of the nobility dangling around. +It would make you wish you could kiss the two dear old souls, Gaius the +innkeeper and Old Honest his guest, if you would only read how they laid +their grey heads together to help forward the love-making of Matthew and +Mercy. Yes, it would be a great pity, said Old Honest,--thinking with a +sigh of his own childless old age,--it would be a great pity if this +excellent family of our sainted brother should fail for want of children, +and die out like mine. And the two old plotters went together to the +mother of the bridegroom, and told her with an aspect of authority that +she must put no obstacle in her son's way, but take Mercy as soon as +convenient into a closer relation to herself. And Gaius said that he for +his part would give the marriage supper. And I shall make no will, said +Honest, but hand all I have over to Matthew my son. This is the way, +said Old Honest; and he skipped and smiled and kissed the cheek of the +aged mother and said, Then thy two children shall preserve thee and thy +husband a posterity in the earth! Then he turned to the boys and he +said, Matthew, be thou like Matthew the publican, not in vice, but in +virtue. Samuel, he said, be thou like Samuel the prophet, a man of faith +and of prayer. Joseph, said he, be thou like Joseph in Potiphar's house, +chaste, and one that flees from temptation. And James, be thou like +James the Just, and like James the brother of our Lord. Mercy, he said, +is thy name, and by mercy shalt thou be sustained and carried through all +thy difficulties that shall assault thee in the way, till thou shalt come +thither where thou shalt look the Fountain of Mercy in the face with +comfort. And all this while the guide, Mr. Greatheart, was very much +pleased, and smiled upon the nimble old gentleman. + +5. "Then it came to pass a while after that there was a post in the town +that inquired for Mr. Honest. So he came to his house where he was, and +delivered to his hands these lines, Thou art commanded to be ready +against this day seven night, to present thyself before thy Lord at His +Father's house. And for a token that my message is true, all thy +daughters of music shall be brought low. Then Mr. Honest called for his +friends and said unto them, I die, but shall make no will. As for my +honesty, it shall go with me: let him that comes after me be told of +this. When the day that he was to be gone was come he addressed himself +to go over the river. Now, the river at that time overflowed the banks +at some places. But Mr. Honest in his lifetime had spoken to one Good- +conscience to meet him there, the which he also did, and lent him his +hand, and so helped him over. The last words of Mr. Honest were, Grace +reigns! So he left the world." Look at that picture and now look at +this: "They then addressed themselves to the water, and, entering, +Christian began to sink, and crying out to his good friend Hopeful, he +said, I sink in deep waves, the billows go over my head, all His waters +go over me. Then said the other, Be of good cheer, my brother, I feel +the bottom, and it is good. Then said Christian, Ah, my friend, the +sorrows of death have compassed me about; I shall not see the land that +flows with milk and honey. And with that a great horror and darkness +fell upon Christian, so that he could not see before him; and all the +words that he spoke still tended to discover that he had horror of mind +lest he should die in that river and never obtain entrance in at the +gate. Here also, as they that stood by perceived, he was much in the +troublesome thoughts of the sins that he had committed, both since and +before he began to be a pilgrim. 'Twas also observed that he was +troubled with apparitions of hobgoblins and evil spirits. Hopeful, +therefore, had much ado to keep his brother's head above water. Yea, +sometimes he would be quite gone down, and then ere a while he would rise +up again half dead." My brethren, all my brethren, be not deceived; God +is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap. Whom +the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth. +Thou, O God, wast a God that forgavest them, but Thou tookest vengeance +on their inventions. + + + + +MR. FEARING + + + "Happy is the man that feareth alway."--_Solomon_ + +For humour, for pathos, for tenderness, for acute and sympathetic insight +at once into nature and grace, for absolutely artless literary skill, and +for the sweetest, most musical, and most exquisite English, show me +another passage in our whole literature to compare with John Bunyan's +portrait of Mr. Fearing. You cannot do it. I defy you to do it. +Spenser, who, like John Bunyan, wrote an elaborate allegory, says: It is +not in me. Take all Mr. Fearing's features together, and even +Shakespeare himself has no such heart-touching and heart-comforting +character. Addison may have some of the humour and Lamb some of the +tenderness; but, then, they have not the religion. Scott has the insight +into nature, but he has no eye at all for grace; while Thackeray, who, in +some respects, comes nearest to John Bunyan of them all, would be the +foremost to confess that he is not worthy to touch the shoe-latchet of +the Bedford tinker. As Dr. Duncan said in his class one day when telling +us to read Augustine's Autobiography and Halyburton's:--"But," he said, +"be prepared for this, that the tinker beats them all!" "Methinks," says +Browning, "in this God speaks, no tinker hath such powers." + +Now, as they walked along together, the guide asked the old gentleman if +he knew one Mr. Fearing that came on pilgrimage out of his parts. "Yes," +said Mr. Honest, "very well. He was a man that had the root of the +matter in him; but he was one of the most troublesome pilgrims that ever +I met with in all my days." "I perceive you knew him," said the guide, +"for you have given a very right character of him." "Knew him!" +exclaimed Honest, "I was a great companion of his; I was with him most an +end. When he first began to think of what would come upon us hereafter, +I was with him." "And I was his guide," said Greatheart, "from my +Master's house to the gates of the Celestial City." "Then," said Mr. +Honest, "it seems he was well at last." "Yes, yes," answered the guide, +"I never had any doubt about him; he was a man of a choice spirit, only +he was always kept very low, and that made his life so burdensome to +himself and so troublesome to others. He was, above many, tender of sin; +he was so afraid of doing injuries to others that he would often deny +himself of that which was lawful because he would not offend." "But +what," asked Honest, "should be the reason that such a good man should be +all his days so much in the dark?" "There are two sorts of reasons for +it," said the guide; "one is, the wise God will have it so: some must +pipe and some must weep. Now, Mr. Fearing was one that played upon this +base. He and his fellows sound the sackbut, whose notes are more doleful +than the notes of other music are. Though, indeed, some say that the +base is the ground of music. And, for my part, I care not at all for +that profession that begins not with heaviness of mind. The first string +that the musician usually touches is the base when he intends to put all +in tune. God also plays upon this string first when He sets the soul in +tune for Himself. Only, here was the imperfection of Mr. Fearing, that +he could play upon no other music but this till toward his latter end." + +1. Take Mr. Fearing, then, to begin with, at the Slough of Despond. +Christian and Pliable, they being heedless, did both fall into that bog. +But Mr. Fearing, whatever faults you may think he had--and faults, too, +that you think you could mend in him--at any rate, he was never heedless. +Everybody has his fault to find with poor Mr. Fearing. Everybody blames +poor Mr. Fearing. Everybody can improve upon poor Mr. Fearing. But I +will say again for Mr. Fearing that he was never heedless. Had Peter +been on the road at that period he would have stood up for Mr. Fearing, +and would have taken his judges and would have said to them, with some +scorn--Go to, and pass the time of your sojourning here with something of +the same silence and the same fear! Christian's excuse for falling into +the Slough was that fear so followed him that he fled the next way, and +so fell in. But Mr. Fearing had no such fear behind him in his city as +Christian had in his. All Mr. Fearing's fears were within himself. If +you can take up the distinction between actual and indwelling sin, +between guilt and corruption, you have already in that the whole key to +Mr. Fearing. He was blamed and counselled and corrected and pitied and +patronised by every morning-cloud and early-dew neophyte, while all the +time he lived far down from the strife of tongues where the root of the +matter strikes its deep roots still deeper every day. "It took him a +whole month," tells Greatheart, "to face the Slough. But he would not go +back neither. Till, one sunshiny morning, nobody ever knew how, he +ventured, and so got over. But the fact of the matter is," said the +shrewd-headed guide, "Mr. Fearing had, I think, a slough of despond in +his own mind; and a slough that he carried everywhere with him." Yes, +that was it. Greatheart in that has hit the nail on the head. With one +happy stroke he has given us the whole secret of poor Mr. Fearing's life- +long trouble. Just so; it was the slough in himself that so kept poor +Mr. Fearing back. This poor pilgrim, who had so little to fear in his +past life, had yet so much scum and filth, spume and mire in his present +heart, that how to get on the other side of that cost him not a month's +roaring only, but all the months and all the years till he went over the +River not much above wet-shod. And, till then, not twenty million cart- +loads of wholesome instructions, nor any number of good and substantial +steps, would lift poor Mr. Fearing over the ditch that ran so deep and so +foul continually within himself. "Yes, he had, I think, a slough of +despond in his mind, a slough that he carried everywhere with him, or +else he never could have been the man he was." I, for one, thank the +great-hearted guide for that fine sentence. + +2. It was a sight to see poor Mr. Fearing at the wicket gate. "Knock, +and it shall be opened unto you." He read the inscription over the gate +a thousand times, but every time he read it his slough-filled heart said +to him, Yes, but that is not for such as you. Pilgrim after pilgrim came +up the way, read the writing, knocked, and was taken in; but still Mr. +Fearing stood back, shaking and shrinking. At last he ventured to take +hold of the hammer that hung on the gate and gave with it a small rap +such as a mouse might make. But small as the sound was, the Gatekeeper +had had his eye on his man all the time out of his watch-window; and +before Mr. Fearing had time to turn and run, Goodwill had him by the +collar. But that sudden assault only made Mr. Fearing sink to the earth, +faint and half-dead. "Peace be to thee, O trembling man!" said Goodwill. +"Come in, and welcome!" When he did venture in, Mr. Fearing's face was +as white as a sheet. You would have said that an officer had caught a +thief if you had seen poor Mr. Fearing hiding his face, and the +Gatekeeper hauling him in. And not all the entertainment for which the +Gate was famous, nor all the encouragement that Goodwill was able to +speak, could make terrified Mr. Fearing for once to smile. A more hard- +to-entertain pilgrim, all the Gate declared when he had gone, they had +never had in their hospitable house. + +3. "So he came," said the guide, "till he came to our House; but as he +behaved himself at the Gate, so he did at my Master the Interpreter's +door. He lay about in the cold a good while before he would adventure to +call. Yet he would not go back neither. And the nights were cold and +long then. At last I think I looked out of the window, and perceiving a +man to be up and down about the door, I went out to him, and asked what +he was; but, poor man, the water stood in his eyes. So I perceived what +he wanted. I went in, therefore, and told it in the house, and we showed +the thing to our Lord. So He sent me out again to entreat him to come +in, but I dare say I had hard work to do it. At last he came in, and I +will say that for my Lord, He carried it wonderful lovingly to Mr. +Fearing. There were but a few good bits at the table, but some of it was +laid upon his trencher." In this way the guide tells us his first +introduction to Mr. Fearing, and how Mr. Fearing behaved himself in the +Interpreter's House. For instance, in the parlour full of dust, when the +Interpreter said that the dust is original sin and inward corruption, you +would have thought that the Interpreter had stabbed poor Mr. Fearing to +the heart, so did he break out and weep. Before the damsel could come +with the pitcher, Mr. Fearing's eyes alone would have laid the dust, they +were such a fountain of tears. When he saw Passion and Patience, each +one in his chair--"I am that child in rags," said Mr. Fearing; "I have +already received all my good things!" Also, at the wall where the fire +burned because oil was poured into it from the other side, he perversely +turned that fire also against himself. And when they came to the man in +the iron cage, you could not have told whether the miserable man inside +the cage or the miserable man outside of it sighed the loudest. And so +on, through all the significant rooms. The spider-room overwhelmed him +altogether, till his sobs and the beating of his breast were heard all +over the house. The robin also when gobbling up spiders he made an +emblem of himself, and the tree that was rotten at the heart,--till the +Interpreter's patience with this so perverse pilgrim was fairly worn out. +So the Interpreter shut up his significant rooms, and had this so +troublesome pilgrim into his own chamber, and there carried it so +tenderly to Mr. Fearing that at last he did seem to have taken some +little heart of grace. "And then we," said Greatheart, "set forward, and +I went before him; but the man was of few words, only he would often sigh +aloud." + +4. "Dumpish at the House Beautiful" is his biographer's not very +respectful comment on the margin of the history. There were too many +merry-hearted damsels running up and down that house for Mr. Fearing. He +could not lift his eyes but one of those too-tripping maidens was looking +at him. He could not stir a foot but he suddenly ran against a talking +and laughing bevy of them. There was one thing he loved above +everything, and that was to overhear the talk that went on at that season +in that house about the City above, and about the King of that City, and +about His wonderful ways with pilgrims, and the entertainment they all +got who entered that City. But to get a word out of Mr. Fearing upon any +of these subjects,--all the king's horses could not have dragged it out +of him. Only, the screen was always seen to move during such +conversations, till it soon came to be known to all the house who was +behind the screen. And the talkers only talked a little louder as the +screen moved, and took up, with a smile to one another, another and a yet +more comforting topic. + +The Rarity Rooms also were more to Mr. Fearing than his necessary food. +He would be up in the morning and waiting at the doors of those rooms +before the keepers had come with their keys. And they had to tell him +that the candles were to be put out at night before he would go away. He +was always reading, as if he had never read it before, the pedigree of +the Lord of the Hill. Moses' rod, Shamgar's goad, David's sling and +stone, and what not--he laughed and danced and sang like a child around +these ancient tables. The armoury-room also held him, where were the +swords, and shields, and helmets, and breast-plates, and shoes that would +not wear out. You would have thought you had your man all right as long +as you had him alone among these old relics; but, let supper be ready, +and the house gathered, and Mr. Fearing was as dumpish as ever. Eat he +would not, drink he would not, nor would he sit at the same table with +those who ate and drank with such gladness. I remembered Mr. Fearing at +the House Beautiful when I was present at a communion season some time +back in Ross-shire. The church was half full of Mr. Fearing's close +kindred that communion morning. For, all that the minister himself could +do, and all that the assisting minister could do--no! to the table those +self-examined, self-condemned, fear-filled souls would not come. The two +ministers, like Mr. Greatheart's Master, carried it wonderful lovingly +with those poor saints that day; but those who are in deed, and not in +name only, passing the time of their sojourning here in fear--they cannot +all at once be lifted above all their fears, even by the ablest action +sermons, or by the most wise and tender table-addresses. And, truth to +tell, though you will rebuke me all the way home to-night for saying it, +my heart sat somewhat nearer to those old people who were perhaps a +little too dumpish in their repentance and their faith and their hope +that morning, than it did to those who took to the table with a light +heart. I know all your flippant cant about gospel liberty and against +Highland introspection, as you call it--as well as all your habitual +neglect of a close and deep self-examination, as Paul called it; but I +tell you all to-night that it would be the salvation of your soul if you +too worked your way up to every returning Lord's table with much more +fear and much more trembling. Let a man examine himself, Saxon as well +as Celt, in Edinburgh as well as in Ross-shire, and so let him eat of +that flesh and drink of that blood. "These pills," said Mr. Skill, "are +to be taken three at a time fasting in half a quarter of a pint of the +tears of repentance; these pills are good to prevent diseases, as well as +to cure when one is sick. Yea, I dare say it, and stand to it, that if a +man will but use this physic as he should, it will make him live for +ever. But thou must give these pills no other way but as I have +prescribed; for, if you do, they will do no good." "Then he and I set +forward," said the guide, "and I went before; but my man was of but few +words, only he would often sigh aloud." + +5. As to the Hill Difficulty, that was no stick at all to Mr. Fearing; +and as for the lions, he pulled their whiskers and snapped his fingers in +their dumfoundered faces. For you must know that Mr. Fearing's trouble +was not about such things as these at all; his only fear was about his +acceptance at last. He beat Mr. Greatheart himself at getting down into +the Valley of Humiliation, till the guide was fain to confess that he +went down as well as he ever saw man go down in all his life. This +pilgrim cared not how mean he was, so he might be but happy at last. That +is the reason why so many of God's best saints take so kindly and so +quietly to things that drive other men mad. You wonder sometimes when +you see an innocent man sit down quietly under accusations and insults +and injuries that you spend all the rest of your life resenting and +repaying. And that is the reason also that so many of God's best saints +in other ages and other communions used to pursue evangelical humility +and ascetic poverty and seclusion till they obliterated themselves out of +all human remembrance, and buried themselves in retreats of silence and +of prayer. Yes, you are quite right. A garment of sackcloth may cover +an unsanctified heart; and the fathers of the desert did not all escape +the depths of Satan and the plague of their own heart. Quite true. A +contrite heart may be carried about an applauding city in a coach and +six; and a crucified heart may be clothed in purple and fine linen, and +may fare sumptuously every day. A saint of God will sometimes sit on a +throne with a more weaned mind than that with which Elijah or the Baptist +will macerate themselves in the wilderness. Every man who is really set +on heaven must find his own way thither; and he who is really intent on +his own way thither will neither have the time nor the heart to throw +stones at his brother who thinks he has discovered his own best way. All +the pilgrims who got to the City at last did not get down Difficulty and +through Humiliation so well as Mr. Fearing did; nor was it absolutely +necessary that they should. It was not to lay down an iron-fast rule for +others, but it was only to amuse the way with his account of Mr. Fearing, +that the guide went on to say: "Yes, I think there was a kind of sympathy +betwixt that valley and my man. For I never saw him better in all his +pilgrimage than when he was in that valley. For here he would lie down, +embrace the ground, and kiss the very flowers that grew in this valley. +He would now be up every morning by break of day, tracing and walking to +and fro in that valley." + +6. Now, do you think you could guess how Mr. Fearing conducted himself +in Vanity Fair? Your guess is important to us and to you to-night; for +it will show whether or no John Bunyan and Mr. Greatheart have spent +their strength for nought and in vain on you. It will show whether or no +you have got inside of Mr. Fearing with all that has been said; and thus, +inside of yourself. Guess, then. How did Mr. Fearing do in Vanity Fair, +do you think? To give you a clue, recollect that he was the timidest of +souls. And remember how you have often been afraid to look at things in +a shop window lest the shopkeeper should come out and hold you to the +thing you were looking at. Remember also that you are the life-long +owners of some things just because they were thrown at your head. +Remember how you sauntered into a sale on one occasion, and, out of sheer +idleness and pure fun, made a bid, and to your consternation the +encumbrance was knocked down to your name; and it fills up your house to- +day till you would give ten times its value to some one to take it away +for ever out of your sight. Well, what was it that those who were so +shamelessly and so pesteringly cadging about places, and titles, and +preferments, and wives, and gold, and silver, and such like--what was it +they prevailed on this poor stupid countryman to cheapen and buy? Do you +guess, or do you give it up? Well, Greatheart himself was again and +again almost taken in; and would have been had not Mr. Fearing been +beside him. But Mr. Fearing looked at all the jugglers, and cheats, and +knaves, and apes, and fools as if he would have bitten a firebrand. "I +thought he would have fought with all the men of the fair; I feared there +we should have both been knock'd o' th' head, so hot was he against their +fooleries." And then--for Greatheart was a bit of a philosopher, and +liked to entertain and while the away with tracing things up to their +causes--"it was all," he said, "because Mr. Fearing was so tender of sin. +He was above many tender of sin. He was so afraid, not for himself only, +but of doing injury to others, that he would deny himself the purchase +and possession and enjoyment even of that which was lawful, because he +would not offend." "All this while," says Bunyan himself, in the eighty- +second paragraph of _Grace Abounding_, "as to the act of sinning I was +never more tender than now. I durst not take a pin or a stick, though +but so big as a straw, for my conscience now was sore and would smart at +every touch. I could not now tell how to speak my words for fear I +should misplace them." "The highest flames," says Jeremy Taylor in his +_Life of Christ_, "are the most tremulous." + +7. "But when he was come at the river where was no bridge, there, again, +Mr. Fearing was in a heavy case. Now, he said, he should be drowned for +ever, and so never see that Face with comfort that he had come so many +miles to behold. And here also I took notice of what was very +remarkable; the water of that river was lower at this time than ever I +saw it in all my life, so he went over at last not much above wet-shod." +Then said Christiana, "This relation of Mr. Fearing has done me good. I +thought nobody had been like me, but I see there was some semblance +betwixt this good man and I, only we differed in two things. His +troubles were so great that they broke out, but mine I kept within. His +also lay so hard upon him that he could not knock at the houses provided +for entertainment, but my trouble was always such that it made me knock +the louder." "If I might also speak my heart," said Mercy, "I must say +that something of him has also dwelt in me. For I have ever been more +afraid of the lake, and the loss of a place in Paradise, than I have been +of the loss of other things. Oh! thought I, may I have the happiness to +have a habitation there: 'tis enough though I part with all the world to +win it." Then said Matthew, "Fear was one thing that made me think that +I was far from having that within me that accompanies salvation; but if +it was so with such a good man as he, why may it not also go well with +me?" "No fears, no grace," said James. "Though there is not always +grace where there is fear of hell; yet, to be sure, there is no grace +where there is no fear of God." "Well said, James," said Greatheart; +"thou hast hit the mark, for the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom; +and, to be sure, they that want the beginning have neither middle nor +end." But we shall here conclude our discourse of Mr. Fearing after we +have sent after him this farewell:-- + + "It is because + Then thou didst fear, that now thou dost not fear. + Thou hast forestalled the agony, and so + For thee the bitterness of death is past. + Also, because already in thy soul + The judgment is begun. That day of doom, + One and the same for this collected world-- + That solemn consummation for all flesh, + Is, in the case of each, anticipate + Upon his death; and, as the last great day + In the particular judgment is rehearsed, + So now, too, ere thou comest to the Throne, + A presage falls upon thee, as a ray + Straight from the Judge, expressive of thy lot. + That calm and joy uprising in thy soul + Is first-fruit to thy recompense, + And heaven begun." + + + + +FEEBLE-MIND + + + "Comfort the feeble-minded."--_Paul_. + +Feeble-mind shall first tell you his own story in his own words, and then +I shall perhaps venture a few observations upon his history and his +character. + +"I am but a sickly man, as you see," said Feeble-mind to Greatheart, "and +because Death did usually knock once a day at my door, I thought I should +never be well at home. So I betook myself to a pilgrim's life, and have +travelled hither from the town of Uncertain, where I and my father were +born. I am a man of no strength at all of body, nor yet of mind; but +would, if I could, though I can but crawl, spend my life in the pilgrim's +way. When I came at the gate that is at the head of the way, the Lord of +that place did entertain me freely. Neither objected he against my +weakly looks, nor against my feeble mind; but gave me such things as were +necessary for my journey, and bade me hope to the end. When I came to +the house of the Interpreter I received much kindness there; and, because +the Hill Difficulty was judged too hard for me, I was carried up that +hill by one of his servants. Indeed I have found much relief from +pilgrims, though none were willing to go so softly as I am forced to do. +Yet, still, as they came on, they bid me be of good cheer, and said that +it was the will of their Lord that comfort should be given to the feeble- +minded, and so went on their own pace. I look for brunts by the way; but +this I have resolved on, to wit, to run when I can, to go when I cannot +run, and to creep when I cannot go. As to the main, I thank Him that +loves me, I am fixed. My way is before me, my mind is beyond the river +that has no bridge, though I am, as you see, but of a feeble mind." + +Then said old Mr. Honest, "Have you not some time ago been acquainted +with one Mr. Fearing, a pilgrim?" "Acquainted with him! yes. He came +from the town of Stupidity, which lies four degrees to the northward of +the City of Destruction, and as many off where I was born. Yet we were +well acquainted; for, indeed, he was mine uncle, my father's brother. He +and I have been much of a temper; he was a little shorter than I, but yet +we were much of a complexion." "I perceive that you know him," said Mr. +Honest, "and I am apt to believe also that you were related one to +another; for you have his whitely look, a cast like his with your eye, +and your speech is much alike." + +"Alas!" Feeble-mind went on, "I want a suitable companion. You are all +lusty and strong, but I, as you see, am weak. I choose therefore rather +to come behind, lest, by reason of my many infirmities, I should be both +a burden to myself and to you. I am, as I said, a man of a weak and +feeble mind, and shall be offended and made weak at that which others can +bear. I shall like no laughing; I shall like no gay attire; I shall like +no unprofitable questions. Nay, I am so weak a man as to be offended +with what others have a liberty to do. I do not yet know all the truth. +I am a very ignorant Christian man. Sometimes, if I hear some rejoice in +the Lord, it troubles me because I cannot do so too. It is with me as +with a weak man among the strong, or as with a sickly man among the +healthy, or as a lamp despised." "But, brother," said Greatheart, "I +have it in commission to comfort the feeble-minded and to support the +weak." Thus therefore, they went on--Mr. Greatheart and Mr. Honest went +before; Christiana and her children went next; and Mr. Feeble-mind and +Mr. Ready-to-halt came behind with his crutches. + +1. In the first place, a single word as to Feeble-mind's family tree. + +Thackeray says that _The Peerage_ is the Family Bible of every true-born +Englishman. Every genuine Englishman, he tells us, teaches that sacred +book diligently to his children. He talks out of it to them when he sits +in the house and when he walks by the way. He binds it upon his +children's hands, and it is as a frontlet between their eyes. He writes +its names upon the doorposts of his house, and makes pictures out of it +upon his gates. Now, John Bunyan was a born Englishman in his liking for +a family tree. He had no such tree himself--scarcely so much as a +bramble bush; but, all the same, let the tinker take his pen in hand, and +the pedigrees and genealogies of all his pilgrims are sure to be set +forth as much as if they were to form the certificates that those +pilgrims were to hand in at the gate. + +Feeble-mind, then, was of an old, a well-rooted and a wide-spread race. +The county of Indecision was full of that ancient stock. They had +intermarried in-and-in also till their small stature, their whitely look, +the droop of their eye, and their weak leaky speech all made them to be +easily recognised wherever they went. It was Feeble-mind's salvation +that Death had knocked at his door every day from his youth up. He was +feeble in body as well as in mind; only the feebleness of his body had +put a certain strength into his mind; the only strength he ever showed, +indeed, was the strength that had its roots in a weak constitution at +which sickness and death struck their dissolving blows every day. To +escape death, both the first and the second death, any man with a +particle of strength left would run with all his might; and Feeble-mind +had strength enough somewhere among his weak joints to make him say, "But +this I have resolved on, to wit, to run when I can, to go when I cannot +run, and to creep when I cannot go. As to the main, I am fixed!" + +2. At the Wicket Gate pilgrim Feeble-mind met with nothing but the +kindest and the most condescending entertainment. It was the gatekeepers +way to become all things to all men. The gatekeeper's nature was all in +his name; for he was all Goodwill together. No kind of pilgrim ever came +wrong to Goodwill. He never found fault with any. Only let them knock +and come in and he will see to all the rest. The way is full of all the +gatekeeper's kind words and still kinder actions. Every several pilgrim +has his wager with all the rest that no one ever got such kindness at the +gate as he got. And even Feeble-mind gave the gatekeeper this +praise--"The Lord of the place," he said, "did entertain me freely. +Neither objected he against my weakly looks nor against my feeble mind. +But he gave me such things as were necessary for my journey, and bade me +hope to the end." All things considered, that is perhaps the best praise +that Goodwill and his house ever earned. For, to receive and to secure +Feeble-mind as a pilgrim--to make it impossible for Feeble-mind to +entertain a scruple or a suspicion that was not removed beforehand--to +make it impossible for Feeble-mind to find in all the house and in all +its grounds so much as a straw over which he could stumble--that was +extraordinary attention, kindness, and condescension in Goodwill and all +his good-willed house. "Go on, go on, dear Mr. Feeble mind," said +Goodwill giving his hand to Mr. Fearing's nephew, "go on: keep your +feeble mind open to the truth, and still hope to the end!" + +3. "As to the Interpreter's House, I received much kindness there." That +is all. But in that short speech I think there must he hid no little +shame and remorse. No words could possibly be a severer condemnation of +Feeble-mind than his own two or three so irrelevant words about the +Interpreter's house. No doubt at all, Feeble-mind received kindness +there; but that is not the point. That noble house was not built at such +cost, and fitted up, and kept open all the year round, and filled with +fresh furniture from year to year, merely that those who passed through +its significant rooms might report that they had received no rudeness at +the hands of the Interpreter. "'Come,' said the Interpreter to Feeble- +mind, 'and I will show thee what will be profitable to thee.' So he +commanded his man to light the candle and bid Feeble-mind follow him. But +it was all to no use. Feeble-mind had neither the taste nor the capacity +for the significant rooms. Nay, as one after another of those rich rooms +was opened to him, Feeble-mind took a positive dislike to them. Nothing +interested him; nothing instructed him. But many things stumbled and +angered him. The parlour full of dust, and how the dust was raised and +laid; Passion and Patience; the man in the iron cage; the spider-room; +the muck-rake room; the robin with its red breast and its pretty note, +and yet with its coarse food; the tree, green outside but rotten at the +heart,--all the thanks the Interpreter took that day for all that from +Feeble-mind was in such speeches as these: You make me lose my head. I +do not know where I am. I did not leave the town of Uncertain to be +confused and perplexed in my mind with sights and sounds like these. Let +me out at the door I came in at, and I shall go back to the gate. +Goodwill had none of these unhappy rooms in his sweet house!" Nothing +could exceed the kindness of the Interpreter himself; but his house was +full of annoyances and offences and obstructions to Mr. Feeble-mind. He +did not like the Interpreter's house, and he got out of it as fast as he +could, with his mind as feeble as when he entered it; and, what was +worse, with his temper not a little ruffled. + +And we see this very same intellectual laziness, this very same downright +dislike at divine truth, in our own people every day. There are in every +congregation people who take up their lodgings at the gate and refuse to +go one step farther on the way. A visit to the Interpreter's House +always upsets them. It turns their empty head. They do not know where +they are. They will not give what mind they have to divine truth, all +you can do to draw them on to it, till they die as feeble-minded, as +ignorant, and as inexperienced as they were born. They never read a +religious book that has any brain or heart in it. The feeble _Lives_ of +feeble-minded Christians, written by feeble-minded authors, and published +by feeble-minded publishers,--we all know the spoon-meat that multitudes +of our people go down to their second childhood upon. Jonathan Edwards--a +name they never hear at home, but one of the most masculine and seraphic +of interpreters--has a noble discourse on The Importance and Advantage of +a thorough Knowledge of Divine Truth. "Consider yourselves," he says, +"as scholars or disciples put into the school of Christ, and therefore be +diligent to make proficiency in Christian knowledge. Content not +yourselves with this, that you have been taught your Catechism in your +childhood, and that you know as much of the principles of religion as is +necessary to salvation. Let not your teachers have cause to complain +that while they spend and are spent to impart knowledge to you, you take +little pains to learn. Be assiduous in reading the Holy Scriptures. And +when you read, observe what you read. Observe how things come in. +Compare one scripture with another. Procure and diligently use other +books which may help you to grow in this knowledge. There are many +excellent books extant which might greatly forward you in this knowledge. +There is a great defect in many, that through a lothness to be at a +little expense, they provide themselves with no more helps of this +nature." Weighty, wise, and lamentably true words. + +"Mundanus," says William Law, "is a man of excellent parts, and clear +apprehension. He is well advanced in age, and has made a great figure in +business. He has aimed at the greatest perfection in everything. The +only thing which has not fallen under his improvement, nor received any +benefit from his judicious mind, is his devotion; this is just in the +same poor state it was when he was six years of age, and the old man +prays now in that little form of words which his mother used to hear him +repeat night and morning. This Mundanus that hardly ever saw the poorest +utensil without considering how it might be made or used to better +advantage, has gone on all his life long praying in the same manner as +when he was a child; without ever considering how much better or oftener +he might pray; without considering how improvable the spirit of devotion +is, how many helps a wise and reasonable man may call to his assistance, +and how necessary it is that our prayers should be enlarged, varied, and +suited to the particular state and condition of our lives. How poor and +pitiable is the conduct of this man of sense, who has so much judgment +and understanding in everything but that which is the whole wisdom of +man!" How true to every syllable is that! How simple-looking, and yet +how manly, and able, and noble! We close our young men's session with +Law and Butler to-night, and I cannot believe that our session with those +two giants has left one feeble mind in the two classes; they were all +weeded out after the first fortnight of the session; though, after all is +done, there are still plenty left both among old and young in the +congregation. Even Homer sometimes nods; and I cannot but think that +John Bunyan has made a slip in saying that Feeble-mind enjoyed the +Interpreter's House. At any rate, I wish I could say as much about all +the feeble minds known to me. + +4. The Hill Difficulty, which might have helped to make a man of Feeble- +mind, saw a laughable, if it had not been such a lamentable, spectacle. +For it saw this poor creature hanging as limp as wet linen on the back of +one of the Interpreter's sweating servants. Your little boy will explain +the parable to you. Shall I do this? or, shall I rather do that? asks +Feeble-mind at every stop. Would it be right? or, would it be wrong? +Shall I read that book? Shall I go to that ball? Shall I marry that +man? Tell me what to do. Give me your hand. Take me up upon your back, +and carry me over this difficult hill. "I was carried up that," says +poor Feeble-mind, "by one of his servants." + +5. "The one calamity of Mr. Feeble-mind's history," says our ablest +commentator on Bunyan, "was the finest mercy of his history." That one +calamity was his falling into Giant Slay-good's hands, and his finest +mercy was his rescue by Greatheart, and his consequent companionship with +his deliverer, with Mr. Honest, and with Christiana and her party till +they came to the river. You constantly see the same thing in the life of +the Church and of the Christian Family. Some calamity throws a weak, +ignorant, and immoral creature into close contact with a minister or an +elder or a Christian visitor, who not only relieves him from his present +distress, but continues to keep his eye upon his new acquaintance, +introduces him to wise and good friends, invites him to his house, gives +him books to read, and keeps him under good influences, till, of a weak, +feeble, and sometimes vicious character, he is made a Christian man, till +he is able for himself to say, It was good for me to be afflicted; the +one calamity of my history has been my best mercy! + +6. Feeble-mind, I am ashamed to have to admit, behaved himself in a +perfectly scandalous manner at the house of Gaius mine host. He went +beyond all bounds during those eventful weeks. Those weeks were one long +temptation to Feeble-mind--and he went down in a pitiful way before his +temptation. Two marriages and two honeymoons, with suppers and dances +every night, made the old hostelry like very Pandemonium itself to poor +Feeble-mind. He would have had Matthew's and James's marriages conducted +next door to a funeral. Because he would not eat flesh himself, he +protested against Gaius killing a sheep. "Man," said old Honest, almost +laying his quarterstaff over Feeble-mind's shoulders--"Man, dost thou +think because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?" +"I shall like no laughing," said Feeble-mind; "I shall like no gay +attire; I shall like no unprofitable questions." I think it took some +self-conceit to refuse to sit at table beside Christiana because of her +gay attire. And I hope Mercy did not give up dressing well, even after +she was married, to please that weak-minded old churl. And as to +unprofitable questions--we are all tempted to think that question +unprofitable which our incapacity or our ignorance keeps us silent upon +at table. We think that topic both ill-timed and impertinent and unsafe +to which we are not invited to contribute anything. "I am a very +ignorant man," he went on to say; and, if that was said in any humility, +Feeble-mind never said a truer word. "It is with me as it is with a weak +man among the strong, or as with a sick man among the healthy, or as a +lamp despised in the thought of him that is at ease." All which only +brought Greatheart out in his very best colours. "But, brother," said +the guide, "I have it in commission to comfort the feeble-minded, and to +support the weak. You must needs go along with us; we will wait for you, +we will lend you our help, we will deny ourselves of some things, both +opinionative and practical, for your sake; we will not enter into +doubtful disputations before you; we will be made all things to you +rather than that you shall be left behind." + +7. The first thing that did Mr. Feeble-mind any real good was his being +made military guard over the women and the children while the men went +out to demolish Doubting Castle. _Quis custodiet_? you will smile and +say when you hear that. Who shall protect the protector? you will say. +But wait a little. Greatheart knew his business. For not only did +Feeble-mind rise to the occasion, when he was put to it; but, more than +that, he was the soul of good company at supper-time that night. "Jocund +and merry" are the very words. Yes; give your feeble and fault-finding +folk something to do. Send them to teach a class. Send them down into a +mission district. Lay a sense of responsibility upon them. Leave them +to deal with this and that emergency themselves. Cease carrying them on +your back, and lay weak and evil and self-willed people on their back. +Let them feel that they are of some real use. As Matthew Arnold says, +Let the critic but try practice, and you will make a new man of him. As +Greatheart made of Feeble-mind by making him mount guard over the +Celestial caravan while the fighting men were all up at Doubting Castle. + +8. "Mark this," says Mr. Feeble-mind's biographer on the early margin of +his history, lest we should be tempted to forget the good parts of this +troublesome and provoking pilgrim--"Mark this." This, namely, which +Feeble-mind says to his guide. "As to the main, I thank Him that loves +me, I am fixed. My way is before me, my mind is beyond the river that +has no bridge, though I am, as you see, but of a feeble mind." And that +leads us with returning regard and love to turn to the end of his +history, where we read: "After this Mr. Feeble-mind had tidings brought +him that the post sounded his horn at his chamber door. Then he came in +and told him, saying, I am come to tell thee that thy Master hath need of +thee, and that in very little time thou must behold His face in +brightness. Then Mr. Feeble-mind called for his friends, and told them +what errand had been brought to him, and what token he had received of +the truth of the message. As for my feeble mind he said, that I shall +leave behind me, for I shall have no need of that in the place whither I +go. Nor is it worth bestowing upon the poorest pilgrim. Wherefore, when +I am gone, I desire that you would bury it in a dung-hill. This done, +and the day being come in which he was about to depart, he entered the +river as the rest. His last words were, Hold out, faith and patience! So +he went over to the other side." + + + + +GREAT-HEART + + + "--when thou shalt enlarge my heart."--_David_. + +On Sabbath, the 12th December 1886, I heard the late Canon Liddon preach +a sermon in St. Paul's Cathedral, in which he classed Oliver Cromwell +with Alexander the Sixth and with Richard the Third. I had taken my +estimate of the great Protector's character largely from Carlyle's famous +book, and you can judge with what feelings I heard the canon's +comparison. And, besides, I had been wont to think of the Protector as +having entered largely into John Bunyan's portrait of Greatheart, the +pilgrim guide. And the researches and the judgments of Dr. Gardiner have +only gone to convince me, the eloquent canon notwithstanding, that Bunyan +could not have chosen a better contemporary groundwork for his Greatheart +than just the great Puritan soldier. Cromwell's "mental struggles before +his conversion," his life-long "searchings of heart," his "utter absence +of vindictiveness," his unequalled capacity for "seeing into the heart of +a situation," and his own "all-embracing hospitality of heart"--all have +gone to reassure me that my first guess as to Bunyan's employment of the +Protector's matchless personality and services had not been so far +astray. And the oftener I read the noble history of Greatheart, the +better I seem to hear, beating behind his fine figure, by far the +greatest heart that ever ruled over the realm of England. + +1. The first time that we catch a glimpse of Greatheart's weather-beaten +and sword-seamed face is when he is taking a stolen look out of the +window at Mr. Fearing, who is conducting himself more like a chicken than +a man around the Interpreter's door. And from that moment till Mr. +Fearing shouted "Grace reigns!" as he cleared the last river, never +sportsman surely stalked a startled deer so patiently and so skilfully +and so successfully as Greatheart circumvented that chicken-hearted +pilgrim. "At last I looked out of the window, and perceiving a man to be +up and down about the door, I went out to him and asked him what he was; +but, poor man, the water stood ill his eyes. So I perceived what he +wanted. I went in, therefore, and told it in the house, and we showed +the thing to our Lord. So He sent me out again to entreat him to come +in; but I dare say I had hard work to do it." Greatheart's whole account +of Mr. Fearing always brings the water to my eyes also. It is indeed a +delicious piece of English prose. If I were a professor of _belles +lettres_ instead of what I am, I would compel all my students, under pain +of rustication, to get those three or four classical pages by heart till +they could neither perpetrate nor tolerate bad English any more. This +camp-fire tale, told by an old soldier, about a troublesome young recruit +and all his adventures, touches, surely, the high-water mark of sweet and +undefiled English. Greatheart was not the first soldier who could handle +both the sword and the pen, and he has not been the last. But not Caesar +and not Napier themselves ever handled those two instruments better. + +2. Greatheart had just returned to his Master's house from having seen +Mr. Fearing safely through all his troubles and well over the river, +when, behold, another caravan of pilgrims is ready for his convoy. For +Greatheart, you must know, was the Interpreter's armed servant. When at +any time Greatheart was off duty, which in those days was but seldom, he +took up his quarters again in the Interpreter's house. As he says +himself, he came back from the river-side only to look out of the +Interpreter's window to see if there was any more work on the way for him +to do. And, as good luck would have it, as has been said, the guide was +just come back from his adventures with Mr. Fearing when a pilgrim party, +than which he had never seen one more to his mind, was introduced to him +by his Master, the Interpreter. "The Interpreter," so we read at this +point, "then called for a man-servant of his, one Greatheart, and bid him +take sword, and helmet, and shield, and take these, my daughters," said +he, "and conduct them to the house called Beautiful, at which place they +will rest next. So he took his weapons and went before them, and the +Interpreter said, God-speed." + +3. Now I saw in my dream that they went on, and Greatheart went before +them, so they came to the place where Christian's burden fell off his +back and tumbled into a sepulchre. Here, then, they made a pause, and +here also they blessed God. "Now," said Christiana, "it comes to my mind +what was said to us at the gate; to wit, that we should have pardon by +word and by deed. What it is to have pardon by deed, Mr. Greatheart, I +suppose you know; wherefore, if you please, let us hear your discourse +thereof." "So then, to speak to the question," said Greatheart. You +have all heard about the "question-day" at Highland communions. That day +is so called because questions that have arisen in the minds of "the men" +in connection with doctrine and with experience are on that day set +forth, debated out, and solved by much meditation and prayer; age, +saintliness, doctrinal and experimental reading, and personal experience +all making their contribution to the solution of the question in hand. +Just such a question, then, and handled in such a manner, was that +question which whiled the way and cheated the toil till the pilgrims came +to the House Beautiful. The great doctrinal and experimental Puritans, +with Hooker at their head, put forth their full strength and laid out +their finest work just on this same question that Christiana gave out at +the place, somewhat ascending, upon which stood a cross, and a little +below, in the bottom, a sepulchre. But not the great Comment on The +Galatians itself, next to the Holy Bible as it is, as most fit for a +wounded conscience; no, nor that perfect mass of purest gold, The Learned +Discourse of Justification, nor anything else of that kind known to me, +is for one moment, to compare in beauty, in tenderness, in eloquence, in +scriptural depth, and in scriptural simplicity with Greatheart's noble +resolution of Christiana's question which he made on the way from the +Interpreter's house to the House Beautiful. "This is brave!" exclaimed +that mother in Israel, when the guide had come to an end. "Methinks it +makes my heart to bleed to think that He should bleed for me. O Thou +loving One! O Thou blessed One! Thou deservest to have me, for Thou +hast bought me. No marvel that this made the water to stand in my +husband's eyes, and that it made him trudge so nimbly on. O Mercy, that +thy father and thy mother were here; yea, and Mrs. Timorous too! Nay, I +wish now with all my heart that here was Madam Wanton too. Surely, +surely their hearts would be affected here!" Promise me to read at home +Greatheart's discourse on the Righteousness of Christ, and you will thank +me for having exacted the promise. + +The incongruity of a soldier handling such questions, and especially in +such a style, has stumbled some of John Bunyan's fault-finding readers. +The same incongruity stumbled "the Honourable Colonel Hacker, at Peebles +or elsewhere," to whom Cromwell sent these from Edinburgh on the 25th +December 1650--"But indeed I was not satisfied with your last speech to +me about Empson, that he was a better preacher than fighter or soldier--or +words to that effect. Truly, I think that he that prays and preaches +best will fight best. I know nothing that will give like courage and +confidence as the knowledge of God in Christ will; and I bless God to see +any in this army able and willing to impart the knowledge they have for +the good of others. I pray you receive Captain Empson lovingly: I dare +assure you he is a good man and a good officer; I would we had no worse." + +4. "Will you not go in and stay till morning?" said the porter to +Greatheart, at the gate of the House Beautiful. "No," said the guide; "I +will return to my lord to-night." "O sir!" cried Christiana and Mercy, +"we know not how to be willing you should leave us in our pilgrimage. Oh +that we might have your company till our journey's end." Then said +James, the youngest of the boys, "Pray be persuaded to go with us and +help us, because we are so weak and the way so dangerous as it is." "I +am at my lord's commandment," said Greatheart. "If he shall allow me to +be your guide quite through, I shall willingly wait upon you. But here +you failed at first; for when he bid me come thus far with you, then you +should have begged me of him to have gone quite through with you, and he +would have granted your request. However, at present, I must withdraw, +and so, good Christiana, Mercy, and my brave children, adieu!" "Help +lost for want of asking for," is our author's condemnatory comment on the +margin at this point in the history. And there is not a single page in +my history, or in yours, my brethren, on which the same marginal lament +is not written. What help we would have had on our Lord's promise if we +had but taken the trouble to ask for it! And what help we once had, and +have now lost, just because when we had it we did not ask for a +continuance of it! "No," said Greatheart to the porter, and to the two +women, and to James--"No. I will return to my lord to-night. I am at my +lord's commandment; only, if he shall still allot me I shall willingly +wait upon you." + +Now, what with the House Beautiful, so full of the most delightful +company; what with music in the house and music in the heart; what with +Mr. Brisk's courtship of Mercy, Matthew's illness, Mr. Skill's cure of +the sick man, and what not--a whole month passed by like a day in that so +happy house. But at last Christiana and Mercy signified it to those of +the house that it was time for them to be up and going. Then said Joseph +to his mother, "It is convenient that you send back to the house of Mr. +Interpreter to pray him to grant that Mr. Greatheart should be sent to us +that he may be our conductor the rest of our way." "Good boy," said she, +"I had almost forgot." So she drew up a petition and prayed Mr. Watchful +the porter to send it by some fit man to her good friend, Mr. +Interpreter; who, when it was come and he had seen the contents of the +petition, said to the messenger, "Go, tell them that I will send him." . +. . Now, about this time one knocked at the door. So the porter opened, +and, behold, Mr. Greatheart was there! But when he came in, what joy was +there! Then said Mr. Greatheart to the two women, "My lord has sent each +of you a bottle of wine, and also some parched corn, together with a +couple of pomegranates. He has also sent the boys some figs and raisins +to refresh you on your way." "The weak may sometimes call the strong to +prayers," I read again in the margin opposite the mention of Joseph's +name. Not that I am strong, and not that she is weak, but one of my +people I spent an hour with last afternoon whom you would to a certainty +have called weak had you seen her and her surrounding,--she so called me +to prayer that I had to hurry home and go straight to it. And all last +night and all this morning I have had as many pomegranates as I could eat +and as much wine as I could drink. Yes; you attend to what the weakest +will sometimes say to you, and they will often put you on the way to get +Greatheart back again with a load of wines and fruits and corn on his +shoulder to refresh you on your journey. "Good boy!" said Christiana to +Joseph her youngest son, "Good boy! I had almost forgot!" + +5. When old Mr. Honest began to nod after the good supper that Gaius +mine host gave to the pilgrims, "What, sir," cried Greatheart, "you begin +to be drowsy; come, rub up; now here's a riddle for you." Then said Mr. +Honest, "Let's hear it." Then said Mr. Greatheart, + + "He that will kill, must first be overcome; + Who live abroad would, first must die at home." + +"Hah!" said Mr. Honest, "it is a hard one; hard to expound, and harder +still to practise." Yes; this after-supper riddle of Mr. Greatheart is a +hard one in both respects; and for this reason, because the learned and +much experienced guide--learned with all that his life-long quarters in +the Interpreter's House could teach him, and experienced with a +lifetime's accumulated experience of the pilgrim life--has put all his +learning and all his life into these two mysterious lines. But old +Honest, once he had sufficiently rubbed up his eyes and his intellects, +gave the answer: + + "He first by grace must conquered be + That sin would mortify. + And who, that lives, would convince me, + Unto himself must die." + +Exactly; shrewd old Honest; you have hit off both Greatheart and his +riddle too. You have dived into the deepest heart of the Interpreter's +man-servant. "The magnanimous man" was Aristotle's masterpiece. That +great teacher of mind and morals created for the Greek world their +Greatheart. But, "thou must understand," says Bunyan to his readers, +"that I never went to school to Aristotle or Plato. No; but to Paul, who +taught Bunyan that what Aristotle calls magnanimity is really +pride--taught him that, till there is far more of the Christian religion +in those two doggerel lines at Gaius's supper-table than there is in all +The Ethics taken together. And it is only from a personal experience of +the same life as that which the guide puts here into his riddle that any +man's proud heart will become really humble and thus really great, really +enlarged, and of an all-embracing hospitality like Cromwell's and +Greatheart's and John Bunyan's own. Would you, then, become a Greatheart +too? And would you be employed in your day as they were employed in +their day? Then expound to yourself, and practise, and follow out that +deep riddle with which Greatheart so woke up old Honest: + + "He that will kill, must first be overcome; + Who live abroad would, first must die at home. + +6. Greatheart again and again at the river-side, Greatheart sending +pilgrim after pilgrim over the river with rapture, and he himself still +summoned to turn his back on the Celestial City, and to retrace his steps +through the land of Beulah, through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, +and through the Valley of Humiliation, and back to the Interpreter's +house to take on another and another and another convoy of fresh +pilgrims, and his own abundant entrance still put off and never to +come,--our hearts bleed for poor Greatheart. Back and forward, back and +forward, year after year, this noble soul uncomplainingly goes. And, +ever as he waves his hand to another pilgrim entering with trumpets +within the gates, he salutes his next pilgrim charge with the brave +words: "Yet what I shall choose I wot not. For I am in a strait betwixt +two: having a desire to depart and to be with Christ. Nevertheless to +abide in the flesh is more needful for you, for your furtherance and joy +of faith by my coming to you again." If Greatheart could not "usher +himself out of this life" along with Christiana, and Mercy, and Mr. +Honest, and Standfast, and Valiant-for-truth--if he had still to toil +back and bleed his way up again at the head of another happy band of +pilgrims--well, after all is said, what had the Celestial City itself to +give to Greatheart better than such blessed work? With every such +returning journey he got a more and more enlarged, detached, hospitable, +and Christ-like heart, and the King's palace in very glory itself had +nothing better in store for this soldier-guide than that. A nobler +heaven Greatheart could not taste than he had already in himself, as he +championed another and another pilgrim company from his Master's earthly +gate to his Master's heavenly gate. Like Paul, his apostolic prototype, +Greatheart sometimes vacillated just for a moment when he came a little +too near heaven, and felt its magnificent and almost dissolving +attractions full in his soul. You will see Greatheart's mind staggering +for a moment between rest and labour, between war and peace, between +"Christ" on earth and "Christ" in heaven--you will see all that set forth +with great sympathy and great ability in Principal Rainy's new book on +Paul's Epistle to the Philippians, and in the chapter entitled, The +Apostle's Choice between Living and Dying. + +Then there came a summons for Mr. Standfast. At which he called to him +Mr. Greatheart, and said unto him, "Sir, although it was not my hap to be +much in your good company in the days of my pilgrimage, yet, since the +time I knew you, you have been profitable to me. When I came from home I +left behind me a wife and five small children. Let me entreat you, at +your return (for I know that you will go and return to your master's +house in hopes that you may be a conductor to more of the holy pilgrims), +that you send to my family and let them be acquainted with all that hath +and shall happen to me. Tell them, moreover, of my happy arrival to this +place, and of the present late blessed condition I am in, and so on for +many other messages and charges." Yes, Mr. Standfast; very good. But I +would have liked you on your deathbed much better if you had had a word +to spare from yourself and your wife and your children for poor +Greatheart himself, who had neither wife nor children, nor near hope of +heaven, but only your trust and charge and many suchlike trusts and +charges to carry out when you are at home and free of all trust and all +charge and all care. But yours is the way of all the pilgrims--so long, +at least, as they are in this selfish life. Let them and their children +only be well looked after, and they have not many thoughts or many words +left for those who sweat and bleed to death for them and theirs. They +lean on this and that Greatheart all their own way up, and then they +leave their widows and children to lean on whatever Greatheart is sent to +meet them; but it is not one pilgrim in ten who takes the thought or has +the heart to send a message to Mr. Greatheart himself for his own +consolation and support. I read that Mr. Ready-to-halt alone, good soul, +had the good feeling to do it. He thanked Mr. Greatheart for his conduct +and for his kindness, and so addressed himself to his journey. All the +same, noble Greatheart! go on in thy magnanimous work. Take back all +their errands. Seek out at any trouble all their wives and children. +Embark again and again on all thy former battles and hardships for the +good of other men. But be assured that all this thy labour is not in +vain in thy Lord. Be well assured that not one drop of thy blood or thy +sweat or thy tears shall fall to the ground on that day when they that be +wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that turn +many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever. Go back, then, +from thy well-earned rest, O brave Greatheart! go back to thy waiting +task. Put on again thy whole armour. Receive again, and again fulfil, +thy Master's commission, till He has no more commissions left for thy +brave heart and thy bold hand to execute. And, one glorious day, while +thou art still returning to thy task, it shall suddenly sound in thy +dutiful ears:--"Well done! good and faithful servant!" And then thou too + + "Shalt hang thy trumpet in the hall + And study war no more." + + + + +MR. READY-TO-HALT + + + "For I am ready to halt."--_David_. + +Mr. Ready-to-halt is the Mephibosheth of the pilgrimage. While +Mephibosheth was still a child in arms, his nurse let the young prince +fall, and from that day to the day of his death he was lame in both his +feet. Mephibosheth's life-long lameness, and then David's extraordinary +grace to the disinherited cripple in commanding him to eat continually at +the king's table; in those two points we have all that we know about Mr. +Ready-to-halt also. We have no proper portrait, as we say, of Mr. Ready- +to-halt. Mr. Ready-to-halt is but a name on John Bunyan's pages--a name +set upon two crutches; but, then, his simple name is so suggestive and +his two crutches are so eloquent, that I feel as if we might venture to +take this life-long lameter and his so serviceable crutches for our +character-lecture to-night. + +John Bunyan, who could so easily and so delightfully have done it, has +given us no information at all about Mr. Ready-to-halt's early days. For +once his English passion for a pedigree has not compelled our author's +pen. We would have liked immensely to have been told the name, and to +have seen displayed the whole family tree of young Ready-to-halt's +father; and, especially, of his mother. Who was his nurse also? And did +she ever forgive herself for the terrible injury she had done her young +master? What were his occupations and amusements as a little cripple +boy? Who made him his first crutch? Of what wood was it made? And at +what age, and under whose kind and tender directions did he begin to use +it? And, then, with such an infirmity, what ever put it into Mr. Ready- +to-halt's head to attempt the pilgrimage? For the pilgrimage was a task +and a toil that took all the limbs and all the lungs and all the labours +and all the endurances that the strongest and the bravest of men could +bring to bear upon it. How did this complete cripple ever get through +the Slough, and first up and then down the Hill Difficulty, and past all +the lions, and over a thousand other obstacles and stumbling-blocks, till +he arrived at mine host's so hospitable door? The first surprised sight +we get of this so handicapped pilgrim is when Greatheart and Feeble-mind +are in the heat of their discourse at the hostelry door. At that moment +Mr. Ready-to-halt came by with his crutches in his hand, and he also was +going on pilgrimage. Thus, therefore, they went on. Mr. Greatheart and +Mr. Honest went on before, Christiana and her children went next, and Mr. +Feeble-mind and Mr. Ready-to-halt came behind with his crutches. + + "Put by the curtains, look within my veil, + Turn up my metaphors, and do not fail, + There, if thou seekest them, such things to find, + As will be helpful to an honest mind." + +1. Well, then, when we put by the curtains and turn up the metaphors, +what do we find? What, but just this, that poor Mr. Ready-to-halt was, +after all, the greatest and the best believer, as the New Testament would +have called him, in all the pilgrimage. We have not found so great faith +as that of Mr. Ready-to-halt, no, not in the very best of the pilgrim +bands. Each several pilgrim had, no doubt, his own good qualities; but, +at pure and downright believing--at taking God at His bare and simple +word--Mr. Ready-to-halt beat them all. All that flashes in upon us from +one shining word that stands on the margin of our so metaphorical author. +This single word, the "promises," hangs like a key of gold beside the +first mention of Mr. Ready-to-halt's crutches--a key such that in a +moment it throws open the whole of Mr. Ready-to-halt's otherwise lockfast +and secret and inexplicable life. There it all is, as plain as a pike- +staff now! Yes; Mr. Ready-to-halt's crutches are just the divine +promises. I wonder I did not see that all the time. Why, I could +compose all his past life myself now. I have his father and his mother +and his nurse at my finger-ends now. This poor pilgrim--unless it would +be impertinence to call him poor any more--had no limbs to be called +limbs. Such limbs as he had were only an encumbrance to this unique +pedestrian. All the limbs he had were in his crutches. He had not one +atom of strength to lean upon apart from his crutches. A bone, a muscle, +a tendon, a sinew, may be ill-nourished, undeveloped, green, and unknit, +but, at the worst, they are inside of a man and they are his own. But a +crutch, of however good wood it may be made, and however good a lame man +may be at using it--still, a crutch at its best is but an outside +additament; it is not really and originally a part of a man's very self +at all. And yet a lame man is not himself without his crutch. Other men +do not need to give a moment's forethought when they wish to rise up to +walk, or to run, or to leap, or to dance. But the lame man has to wait +till his crutches are brought to him; and then, after slowly and +painfully hoisting himself up upon his crutches, with great labour, he at +last takes the road. Mr. Ready-to-halt, then, is a man of God; but he is +one of those men of God who have no godliness within themselves. He has +no inward graces. He has no past experiences. He has no attainments +that he can for one safe moment take his stand upon, or even partly lean +upon. Mr. Ready-to-halt is absolutely and always dependent upon the +promises. The promises of God in Holy Scripture are this man's very +life. All his religion stands in the promises. Take away the promises, +and Mr. Ready-to-halt is a heap of heaving rags on the roadside. He +cannot take a single step unless upon a promise. But, at the same time, +give Mr. Ready-to-halt a promise in his hand and he will wade the Slough +upon it, and scale up and slide down the Hill Difficulty upon it, and +fight a lion, and even brain Beelzebub with it, till he will with a +grudge and a doubt exchange it even for the chariots and the horses that +wait him at the river. What a delight our Lord would have taken in Mr. +Ready-to-halt had He come across him on His way to the passover! How He +would have given Mr. Ready-to-halt His arm; how He would have made +Himself late by walking with him, and would still have waited for him! +Nay, had that been a day of chap-books in carpenters' shops and on the +village stalls, how He would have had Mr. Ready-to-halt's story by heart +had any brass-worker in Galilee told the history! Our Lord was within an +inch of telling that story Himself, when He showed Thomas His hands and +His side. And at another time and in another place we might well have +had Mr. Ready-to-halt as one more of our Lord's parables for the common +people. Only, He left the delight and the reward of drawing out this +parable to one He already saw and dearly loved in a far-off island of the +sea, the Puritan tinker of Evangelical England. + +2. And now, after all that, would you think it going too far if I were +to say that in making Himself like unto all His brethren, our Lord made +Himself like Mr. Ready-to-halt too? Indeed He did. And it was because +his Lord did this, that Mr. Ready-to-halt so loved his Lord as to follow +Him upon crutches. It would not be thought seemly, perhaps, to carry the +figure too close to our Lord. But, figure apart, it is only orthodox and +scriptural to say that our Lord accomplished His pilgrimage and finished +His work leaning all along upon His Father's promises. Esaias is very +bold about this also, for he tells his readers again and again that their +Messiah, when He comes, will have to be held up. He will have to be +encouraged, comforted, and carried through by Jehovah. And in one +remarkable passage he lets us see Jehovah hooping Messiah's staff first +with brass, and then with silver, and then with gold. Let Thomas +Goodwin's genius set the heavenly scene full before us. "You have it +dialoguewise set forth," says that great preacher. "First Christ shows +His commission, telling God how He had called Him and fitted Him for the +work of redemption, and He would know what reward He should receive of +Him for so great an undertaking. God at first offers low; only the elect +of Israel. Christ thinks these too few, and not worth so great a labour +and work, because few of the Jews would come in; and therefore He says +that He would labour in vain if this were all His recompense; and yet +withal He tells God that seeing His heart is so much set on saving +sinners, to satisfy Him, He will do it even for those few. Upon this God +comes off more freely, and openeth His heart more largely to Him, as +meaning more amply to content Him for His pains in dying. 'It is a light +thing,' says God to Him, 'that Thou shouldest be My servant to raise up +the tribes of Jacob--that is not worth Thy dying for. I value Thy +sufferings more than so. I will give Thee for a salvation to the ends of +the earth.' Upon this He made a promise to Christ, a promise which God, +who cannot lie, promised before the world began. God cannot lie, and, +most of all, not to His Son." + +And, then, more even than that. This same deep divine tells us that it +is a certain rule in divinity that, whatsoever we receive from Christ, +that He Himself first receives in Himself for us. All the promises of +God's word are made and fulfilled to Christ first, and so to us in and +after Him. In other words, our Lord's life was so planned for Him in +heaven and was so followed out and fulfilled by Him on earth, that, to +take up the metaphor again, He actually tried every crutch and every +staff with His own hands and with His own armpits; He actually leaned +again and again His own whole weight upon every several one of them. +Every single promise, the most unlikely for Him to lean upon and to +plead, yet, be sure of it, He somehow made experiment upon them all, and +made sure that there was sufficient and serviceable grace within and +under every one of them. So that, Mr. Ready-to-halt, there is no +possible staff you can take into your hand that has not already been in +the hand of your Lord. Think of that, O Mr. Ready-to-halt! Reverence, +then, and almost worship thy staff! Throw all thy weight upon thy staff. +Confide all thy weakness to it. Talk to it as thou walkest with it. Make +it talk to thee. Worm out of it all its secrets about its first Owner. +And let it instruct thee about how He walked with it and how He handled +it. The Bible is very bold with its Master. It calls Him by the most +startling names sometimes. There is no name that a penitent and a +returning sinner goes by that the Bible does not put somewhere upon the +sinner's Saviour. And in one place it as good as calls Him Ready-to-halt +in as many words. Nay, it lets us see Him halting altogether for a time; +ay, oftener than once; and only taking the road again, when a still +stronger staff was put into his trembling hand. And if John had but had +room in his crowded gospel he would have given us the very identical +psalm with which our Lord took to the upward way again, strong in His new +staff. "For I am ready to halt," was His psalm in the house of His +pilgrimage, "and My sorrow is continually before Me. Mine enemies are +lively, and they are strong; and they that hate Me wrongfully are +multiplied. They also that render evil for good are Mine adversaries; +because I follow the thing that good is. Forsake Me not, O Lord; O My +God, be not far from Me. Make haste to help Me, O Lord My salvation." + +3. Among all the devout and beautiful fables of the "dispensation of +paganism," there is nothing finer than the fable of blind Tiresias and +his staff. By some sad calamity this old prophet had lost the sight of +his eyes, and to compensate their servant for that great loss the gods +endowed him with a staff with eyes. As Aaron's rod budded before the +testimony and bloomed blossoms and yielded almonds, so Tiresias' staff +budded eyes, and divine eyes too, for the blind prophet's guidance and +direction. Tiresias had but to take his heaven-given staff in his hand, +when, straightway, such a divinity entered into the staff that it both +saw for him with divine eyes, and heard for him with divine ears, and +then led him and directed him, and never once in all his after journeys +let him go off the right way. All other men about him, prophets and +priests both, often lost their way, but Tiresias after his blindness, +never, till Tiresias and his staff became a proverb and a parable in the +land. And just such a staff, just such a crutch, just such a pair of +crutches, were the crutches of our own so homely Mr. Ready-to-halt. With +all their lusty limbs, all the other pilgrims often stumbled and went out +of their way till they had to be helped up, led back, and their faces set +right again. But, last as Mr. Ready-to-halt always came in the +procession--behind even the women and the children as his crutches always +kept him--you will seek in vain for the dot of those crutches on any by- +path or on any wrong road. No; the fact is, if you wish to go to the +same city, and are afraid you lose the way; as Evangelist said, "Do you +see yon shining light?" so I would say to you to-night, "Do you see these +crutch-marks on the road?" Well, keep your feet in the prints of these +crutches, and as sure as you do that they will lead you straight to a +chariot and horses, which, again, will carry you inside the city gates. +For Mr. Ready-to-halt's crutches have not only eyes like Tiresias' staff, +they have ears also, and hands and feet. A lamp also burns on those +crutches; and wine and oil distil from their wonderful wood. Happy +blindness that brings such a staff! Happy exchange! eyes full of earth +and sin for eyes full of heaven and holiness! + +4. "They began to be merry," says our Lord, telling the story of the +heart-broken father who had got back his younger son from a far country. +And even Feeble-mind and Ready-to-halt begin to be merry on the green +that day after Doubting Castle has fallen to Greatheart's arms. Now, +Christiana, if need was, could play upon the viol, and her daughter Mercy +upon the lute; and, since they were so merry disposed, she played them a +lesson, and Mr. Ready-to-halt would dance. So he paid a boy a penny to +hold one of his crutches, and, taking Miss Much-afraid by the hand, to +dancing they went. And, I promise you he footed it well; the lame man +leaped as an hart; also the girl was to be commended, for she answered +the music handsomely. In spite of his life-long infirmity, there was +deep down in Mr. Ready-to-halt an unsuspected fund of good-humour. There +was no heartier merriment on the green that day than was the merriment +that Mr. Ready-to-halt knocked out of his nimble crutch. "True, he could +not dance without one crutch in his hand." True, dear and noble Bunyan, +thou canst not write a single page at any time or on any subject without +thy genius and thy tenderness and thy divine grace marking the page as +thine own alone! + +5. The next time we see Mr. Ready-to-halt he is coming in on his +crutches to see Christiana, for she has sent for him to see him. So she +said to him, "Thy travel hither hath been with difficulty, but that will +make thy rest the sweeter." And then in process of time there came a +post to the town and his business this time was with Mr. Ready-to-halt. +"I am come to thee in the name of Him whom thou hast loved and followed, +though upon crutches. And my message is to tell thee that He expects +thee at His table to sup with Him in His kingdom the next day after +Easter." "I am sent for," said Mr. Ready-to-halt to his fellow-pilgrims, +"and God shall surely visit you also. These crutches," he said, "I +bequeath to my son that shall tread in my steps, with an hundred warm +wishes that he may prove better than I have done." Isaac was a child of +promise, and Mr. Ready-to-halt had an Isaac also on whom his last +thoughts turned. Isaac had been born to Abraham by a special and +extraordinary and supernatural interposition of the grace and the power +of God; and Mr. Ready-to-halt had always looked on himself as a second +Abraham in that respect. A second Abraham, and more. True, his son was +not yet a pilgrim; perhaps he was too young to be so called; but +Greatheart will take back the old man's crutches--Greatheart was both man- +of-war and beast-of-burden to the pilgrims and their wives and +children--and will in spare hours teach young Ready-to-halt the use of +the crutch, till the son can use with the same effect as his father his +father's instrument. Is your child a child of promise? Is he to you a +product of nature, or of grace? Did you receive him and his brothers and +sisters from God after you were as good as dead? Did you ever steal in +when his nurse was at supper and say over his young cradle, He hath not +dealt with me after my sins, nor rewarded me according to my iniquities? +Is it in your will laid up with Christ in God about your crutches and +your son what Mr. Ready-to-halt dictated on his deathbed? And does God +know that there is no wish in your old heart a hundred times so warm for +your son as is this wish,--that he may prove better at handling God's +promises than you have been? Then, happy son, who has old Mr. Ready-to- +halt for his father! + +6. "He whom thou hast loved and followed, though upon crutches, expects +thee at His table the next day after Easter." Take comfort, cripples! +Had it been said that the King so expects Greatheart, or Standfast, or +Valiant-for-truth, that would have been after the manner of the kings of +this world. But to insist on having Mr. Ready-to-halt beside Him by such +and such a day; to send such a post to a pilgrim who has not a single +sound bone in all his body; to a sinner without a single trustworthy +grace in all his heart; to a poor and simple believer who has nothing in +his hand but one of God's own promises--Who is a king like unto our King? +Surely King David was never a better type of Christ than when he said to +Mephibosheth, lame in both his feet from his nurse's arms: "Fear not, +Mephibosheth, for I will surely show thee kindness, and thou shalt eat +bread at my table continually." And Mephibosheth shall always be our +spokesman when he bows himself and says in return: "What is thy servant, +that thou shouldst look upon such a dead dog as I am?" + + + + +VALIANT-FOR-TRUTH + + + "--They are not valiant for the truth."--_Jeremiah_ + + "--Ye should contend earnestly for the faith."--_Jude_. + + "Forget not Master Valiant-for-the-Truth, + That man of courage, tho' a very youth. + Tell every one his spirit was so stout, + No man could ever make him face about." + _Bunyan_. + +"I am of Dark-land, for there was I born, and there my father and mother +are still." "Dark-land," said the guide; "doth not that lie upon the +same coast as the City of Destruction?" "Yes, it doth," replied Valiant- +for-truth. "And had I not found incommodity there, I had not forsaken it +at all; but finding it altogether unsuitable to me, and very unprofitable +for me, I forsook it for this way. Now, that which caused me to come on +pilgrimage was this. We had one Mr. Tell-true came into our parts, and +he told it about what Christian had done, that went from the City of +Destruction. That man so told the story of Christian and his travels +that my heart fell into a burning haste to be gone after him, nor could +my father and mother stay me, so I got from them, and am come thus far on +my way." + +1. A very plain and practical lesson is already read to us all in +Valiant-for-truth's explanation of his own pilgrimage. He tells the +guide that he was made a pilgrim just by having the story of The Pilgrim +told to him. All that Tell-true did was just to recite the story of the +pilgrim, when young Valiant's heart fell into a burning haste to be a +pilgrim too. My brethren, could any lesson be plainer? Read the +_Pilgrim's Progress_ with your children. And, after a time, read it +again till they call it beautiful, and till you see the same burning +haste in their hearts that young Valiant felt in his heart. Circulate +the _Pilgrim's Progress_. Make opportunities to give the _Pilgrim's +Progress_ to the telegraph boys and errand boys at your door. Never go +on a holiday without taking a dozen cheap and tasteful copies of _The +Pilgrim_ to give to boys and girls in the country. Make sure that no +one, old or young, of your acquaintance, in town or country, is without a +good copy of _The Pilgrim_. And the darker their house is, make all the +more sure that John Bunyan is in it. + + "Now may this little book a blessing be, + To those that love this little book and me + And may its buyer have no cause to say + His money is but lost or thrown away." + +2. But the great lesson of Valiant's so impressive life lies in the +tremendous fight he had with three ruffians who all set upon him at once +and well-nigh made an end of him. For, when we put by the curtains here +again, and turn up the metaphors, what do we find? What, but a lesson of +first-rate importance for many men among ourselves; for many public men, +many ministers, and many other much-in-earnest men. For Valiant, as his +name tells us, was set to contend for the truth. He had the truth. The +truth was put into his keeping, and he was bound to defend it. He was +thrown into a life of controversy, and thus into all the terrible +temptations--worse than the temptations to whoredom or wine--that +accompany a life of controversy. The three scoundrels that fell upon +Valiant at the mouth of the lane were Wildhead, Inconsiderate, and +Pragmatic. In other words, the besetting temptations of many men who are +set as defenders of the truth in religion, as well as in other matters, +is to be wild-headed, inconsiderate, self-conceited, and intolerably +arrogant. The bloody battle that Valiant fought, you must know, was not +fought at the mouth of any dark lane in the midnight city, nor on the +side of any lonely road in the moonless country. This terrible fight was +fought in Valiant's own heart. For Valiant was none of your calculating +and cold-blooded friends of the truth. He did not wait till he saw the +truth walking in silver slippers. Let any man lay a finger on the truth, +or wag a tongue against the truth, and he will have to settle it with +Valiant. His love for the truth was a passion. There was a fierceness +in his love for the truth that frightened ordinary men even when they +were on his own side. Valiant would have died for the truth without a +murmur. But, with all that, Valiant had to learn a hard and a cruel +lesson. He had to learn that he, the best friend of truth as he thought +he was, was at the same time, as a matter of fact, the greatest enemy +that the truth had. He had to take home the terrible discovery that no +man had hurt the truth so much as he had done. Save me from my friend! +the truth was heard to say, as often as she saw him taking up his weapons +in her behalf. We see all that every day. We see Wildhead at his +disservice of the truth every day. Sometimes above his own name, and +sometimes with grace enough to be ashamed to give his name, in the +newspapers. Sometimes on the platform; sometimes in the pulpit; and +sometimes at the dinner-table. But always to the detriment of the truth. +In blind fury he rushes at the character and the good name of men who +were servants of the truth before he was born, and whose shield he is not +worthy to bear. How shall Wildhead be got to see that he and the like of +him are really the worst friends the truth can possibly have? Will he +never learn that in his wild-bull gorings at men and at movements, he is +both hurting himself and hurting the truth as no sworn enemy of his and +of the truth can do? Will he never see what an insolent fool he is to go +on imputing bad motives to other men, when he ought to be prostrate +before God on account of his own? More than one wild-headed student of +William Law has told me what a blessing they have got from that great +man's teaching on the subject of controversy. Will the Wildheads here to- +night take a line or two out of that peace-making author and lay them to +heart? "My dear L-, take notice of this, that no truths, however solid +and well-grounded, will help you to any divine life, but only so far as +they are taught, nourished, and strengthened by an unction from above; +and that nothing more dries and extinguishes this heavenly unction than a +talkative reasoning temper that is always catching at every opportunity +of hearing or telling some religious matters. Stop your ears and shut +your eyes to all religious tales . . . I would no more bring a false +charge against a deist than I would bear false witness against an +apostle. And if I knew how to do the deists more justice in debate I +would gladly do it . . . And as the gospel requires me to be as glad to +see piety, equity, strict sobriety, and extensive charity in a Jew or a +Gentile as in a Christian; as it obliges me to look with pleasure upon +their virtues, and to be thankful to God that such persons have so much +of true and sound Christianity in them; so it cannot be an unchristian +spirit to be as glad to see truths in one party of Christians as in +another, and to look with pleasure upon any good doctrines that are held +by any sect of Christian people, and to be thankful to God that they have +so much of the genuine saving truths of the gospel among them . . . +Selfishness and partiality are very inhuman and base qualities even in +the things of this world, but in the doctrines of religion they are of a +far baser nature. In the present divided state of the Church, truth +itself is torn and divided asunder; and, therefore, he is the only true +Catholic who has more of truth and less of error than is hedged in by any +divided part. To see this will enable us to live in a divided part +unhurt by its division, and keep us in a true liberty and fitness to be +edified and assisted by all the good that we hear or see in any other +part of the Church. And thus, uniting in heart and spirit with all that +is holy and good in all Churches, we enter into the true communion of +saints, and become real members of the Holy Catholic Church, though we +are confined to the outward worship of only one particular part of it. +And thus we will like no truth the less because Ignatius Loyola or John +Bunyan were very jealous for it, nor have the less aversion to any error +because Dr. Trapp or George Fox had brought it forth." If Wildhead would +take a winter of William Law, it would sweeten his temper, and civilise +his manners, and renew his heart. + +3. Inconsiderate, again, is the shallow creature he is, and does the +endless mischief that he does, largely for lack of imagination. He never +thinks--neither before he speaks nor after he has spoken. He never put +himself in another man's place all his days. He is incapable of doing +that. He has neither the head nor the heart to do that. He never once +said, How would I like that said about me? or, How would I like that done +to me? or, How would that look and taste and feel to me if I were in So- +and-so's place? It needs genius to change places with other men; it +needs a grace beyond all genius; and this poor headless and heartless +creature does not know what genius is. It needs imagination, the noblest +gift of the mind, and it needs love, the noblest grace of the heart, to +consider the case of other people, and to see, as Butler says, that we +differ as much from other people as they differ from us. And it is by +far the noblest use of the imagination, far nobler than carving a +Laocoon, or painting a Last Judgment, or writing a "Paradiso" or a +"Paradise Lost," to put ourselves into the places of other men so as to +see with their eyes, and feel with their hearts, and sympathise with +their principles, and even with their prejudices. Now, the inconsiderate +man has so little imagination and so little love that he is sitting here +and does not know what I am saying; and what suspicion he has of what I +am saying is just enough to make him dislike both me and what I am saying +too. But his dull suspicion and his blind dislike are more than made up +for by the love and appreciation of those lovers and defenders of the +truth who painfully feel how wild and inconsiderate, how hot-headed, how +thoughtless, and how reckless their past service even of God's truth has +been. + + "The King is full of grace and fair regard. + Consideration, like an angel, came + And whipp'd the offending Adam out of him." + +4. And as to Pragmatic, I would not call you a stupid person even though +you confided to me that you had never heard this footpad's name till to- +night. John Bunyan has been borrowing Latin again, and not to the +improvement of his style, or to the advantage of his readers. It would +be insufferably pragmatic in me to begin to set John Bunyan right in his +English; but I had rather offend the shades of a hundred John Bunyans +than leave my most unlettered hearer without his full and proper Sabbath- +night lesson. The third armed thief, then, that fell upon Valiant was, +under other names, Impertinence, Meddlesomeness, Officiousness, +Over-Interference. Pragmatic,--by whatever name he calls himself, there +is no mistaking him. He is never satisfied. He is never pleased. He is +never thankful. He is always setting his superiors right. He is like +the Psalmist in one thing, he has more understanding than all his +teachers. And he enjoys nothing more than in letting them know that. +There is nothing he will not correct you in--from cutting for the stone +to commanding the Channel Fleet. Now, if all that has put any visual +image of Pragmatic into your mind, you will see at once what an enemy he +too is fitted to be to the truth. For the truth does not stand in +points, but in principles. The truth does not dwell in the letter but in +the spirit. The truth is not served by setting other people right, but +by seeing every day and in every thing how far wrong we are ourselves. +The truth is like charity in this, that it begins at home. It is like +charity in this also, that it never behaves itself unseemly. A +pragmatical man, taken along with an inconsiderate man, and then a wild- +headed man added on to them, are three about as fatal hands as any truth +could fall into. The worst enemy of the truth must pity the truth, and +feel his hatred at the truth relenting, when he sees her under the +championship of Wildhead, Inconsiderate, and Pragmatic. + +5. The first time we see Valiant-for-truth he is standing at the mouth +of Dead-man's-lane with his sword in his hand and with his face all +bloody. "They have left upon me, as you see," said the bleeding man, +"some of the marks of their valour, and have also carried away with them +some of mine." And, in like manner, we see Paul with the blood of +Barnabas still upon him when he is writing the thirteenth of First +Corinthians; and John with the blood of the Samaritans still upon him +down to his old age when he is writing his First Epistle; and John Bunyan +with the blood of the Quakers upon him when he is covertly writing this +page of his autobiography under the veil of Valiant-for-truth; and +William Law with the blood of Bishop Hoadly and John Wesley dropping on +the paper as he pens that golden passage which ends with Dr. Trapp and +George Fox. Where did you think Paul got that splendid passage about +charity? Where did you think William Law got that companion passage +about Church divisions, and about the Church Catholic? Where are such +passages ever got by inspired apostles, or by any other men, but out of +their own bloody battles with their own wild-headedness, intolerance, +dislike, and resentment? Where do you suppose I got the true key to the +veiled metaphor of Valiant-for-truth? It does not exactly hang on the +doorpost of his history. Where, then, could I get it but off the inside +wall of my own place of repentance? Just as you understand what I am now +labouring to say, not from my success in saying it, but from your own +trespasses against humility and love, your unadvised speeches, and your +wild and whirling words. Without shame and remorse, without +self-condemnation and self-contempt, none of those great passages of +Paul, or John, or Bunyan, or Law were ever written; and without a like +shame, remorse, self-condemnation, and self-contempt they are not rightly +read. + + "Oh! who shall dare in this frail scene + On holiest, happiest thoughts to lean, + On Friendship, Kindred, or on Love? + Since not Apostles' hands can clasp + Each other in so firm a grasp, + But they shall change and variance prove. + + "But sometimes even beneath the moon + The Saviour gives a gracious boon, + When reconciled Christians meet, + And face to face, and heart to heart, + High thoughts of Holy love impart + In silence meek, or converse sweet. + + "Oh then the glory and the bliss + When all that pained or seemed amiss + Shall melt with earth and sin away! + When saints beneath their Saviour's eye, + Filled with each other's company, + Shall spend in love the eternal day!" + +6. Then said Greatheart to Mr. Valiant-for-truth, "Thou hast worthily +behaved thyself; let me see thy sword." So he showed it him. When he +had taken it in his hand and had looked thereon a while, the guide said: +"Ha! it is a right Jerusalem blade!" "It is so," replied its owner. "Let +a man have one of these blades with a hand to wield it, and skill to use +it, and he may venture upon an angel with it. Its edges will never +blunt. It will cut flesh, and bones, and soul, and spirit, and all." +Both Damascus and Toledo blades were famous in former days for their +tenacity and flexibility, and for the beauty and the edge of their steel. +But even a Damascus blade would be worthless in a weak, cowardly, or +unskilled hand; while even a poor sword in the hand of a good swordsman +will do excellent execution. And much more so when you have both a first- +rate sword and a first-rate swordsman, such as both Valiant and his +Jerusalem blade were. Ha! yes. This is a right wonderful blade we have +now in our hand. For this sword was forged in no earthly fire; and it +was whetted to its unapproachable sharpness on no earthly whetstone. But, +best of all for us, when a good soldier of Jesus Christ has this sword +girt on his thigh he is able then to go forth against himself with it; +against his own only and worst enemy--that is, against himself. As here, +against his own wildness of head and pride of heart. Against his own +want of consideration also. "My people do not consider." As also +against himself as a lawless invader of other men's freedom of judgment, +following of truth, public honour, and good name. As the Arabian +warriors see themselves and dress themselves in their swords as in a +glass, so did Valiant-for-truth see the thoughts and intents, the joints +and the marrow of his own disordered soul in his Jerusalem blade. In the +sheen of it he could see himself even when the darkness covered him; and +with its two edges all his after-life he slew both all real error in +other men and all real evil in himself. "Thou hast done well," said +Greatheart the guide. "Thou hast resisted unto blood, striving against +sin. Thou shalt abide by us, come in and go out with us, for we are thy +companions." + +7. "Sir," said the widow indeed to Valiant-for-truth, "sir, you have in +all places shown yourself true-hearted." The first time she ever saw +this man that she is now seeing for the last time on this side the river, +his own mother would not have known him, he was so hacked to pieces with +the swords of his three assailants. But as she washed the blood off the +mangled man's head and face and hands, she soon saw beneath all his +bloody wounds a true, a brave, and a generous-hearted soldier of the +Cross. The heart is always the man. And this woman had lived long +enough with men to have discovered that. And with all his sears she saw +that it was at bottom the truth of his heart that had cast him into so +many bloody encounters. There were men in that company, and men near the +river too, with far fewer marks of battle, and even of defeat, upon them, +who did not get this noble certificate and its accompanying charge and +trust from this clear-eyed widow. And, then, she had never forgot--how +could she?--his exclamation, and almost embrace of her as of his own +mother, when he burst out with his eyes full of blood, "Why, is this +Christian's wife? What! and going on pilgrimage too? It glads my heart! +Good man! How joyful will he be when he shall see her and her children +enter after him in at the gates into the city!" He would have been +hacked a hundred times worse than he was before the widow of Christian, +and the mother of his children, would have seen anything but the manliest +beauty in a young soldier who could salute an old woman in that way. It +gladdened her heart to hear him, you may be sure, as much as it gladdened +his heart to see her. And that was the reason that she actually set +Greatheart himself aside, and left her children under this young man's +sword and shield. "I would also entreat you to have an eye to my +children," she said. Young men, has any dying mother committed her +children, if you at any time see them faint, to you? Have you ever +spoken so comfortably to any poor widow about her sainted husband that +she has passed by some of our foremost citizens, and has astonished and +offended her lawyers by putting a stripling like you into the +trusteeship? Did ever any dying mother say to you that she had seen you +to be so true-hearted at all times that she entreated you to have an eye +to her children? Speaking at this point for myself, I would rather see +my son so trusted at such an hour by such a woman than I would see him +the Chancellor of Her Majesty's Exchequer, or the Governor of the Bank of +England. And so to-night would you. + + + + +STANDFAST + + + "So stand fast in the Lord, my dearly beloved."--_Paul_. + +In his supplementary picture of Standfast John Bunyan is seen at his very +best, both as a religious teacher and as an English author. On the +Enchanted Ground Standfast is set before us with extraordinary insight, +sagacity, and wisdom; and then in the terrible river he is set before us +with an equally extraordinary rapture and transport; while, in all that, +Bunyan composes in English of a strength and a beauty and a music in +which he positively surpasses himself. Just before he closes his great +book John Bunyan rises up and once more puts forth his very fullest +strength, both as a minister of religion and as a classical writer, when +he takes Standfast down into that river which that pilgrim tells us has +been such a terror to so many, and the thought of which has so often +affrighted himself. + +When Greatheart and his charge were almost at the end of the Enchanted +Ground, so we read, they perceived that a little before them was a solemn +noise as of one that was much concerned. So they went on and looked +before them. And behold, they saw, as they thought, a man upon his +knees, with hands and eyes lift up, and speaking, as they thought, +earnestly to one that was above. They drew nigh, but could not tell what +he said; so they went softly till he had done. When he had done, he got +up and began to run towards the Celestial City. "So-ho, friend, let us +have your company," called out the guide. At that the man stopped, and +they came up to him. "I know this man," said Mr. Honest; "his name, I +know, is Standfast, and he is certainly a right good pilgrim." Then +follows a conversation between Mr. Honest and Mr. Standfast, in which +some compliments and courtesies are exchanged, such as are worthy of such +men, met at such a time and in such a place. "Well, but, brother," said +Valiant-for-truth, "tell us, I pray thee, what was it that was the cause +of thy being upon thy knees even now? Was it for that some special mercy +laid obligations upon thee, or how?" And then Standfast tells how as he +was coming along musing with himself, Madam Bubble presented herself to +him and offered him three things. "I was both aweary and sleepy and also +as poor as a howlet, and all that the wicked witch knew. And still she +followed me with her enticements. Then I betook me, as you saw, to my +knees, and with hands lift up and cries, I prayed to Him who had said +that He would help. So just as you came up the gentlewoman went her way. +Then I continued to give thanks for my great deliverance; for I verify +believe she intended me no good, but rather sought to make stop of me in +my journey. What a mercy is it that I did resist her, for whither might +she not have drawn me?" And then, after all this discourse, there was a +mixture of joy and trembling among the pilgrims, but at last they broke +out and sang: + + "What danger is the pilgrim in, + How many are his foes, + How many ways there are to sin, + No living mortal knows!" + +1. "Well, as I was coming along I was musing with myself," said +Standfast. You understand what it is to come along musing with yourself, +do you not, my brethren? "I will muse on the work of Thy hands," says +the Psalmist. And again, "While I was musing the fire burned." Well, +Standfast was much given to musing, just as David was. Each several +pilgrim has his own way of occupying himself on the road; but Standfast +could never get his fill just of musing. Standfast loved solitude. +Standfast liked nothing better than to walk long stretches at a time all +by himself alone. Standfast was like the apostle when he preferred to +take the twenty miles from Troas to Assos on foot and alone, rather than +to round the cape on shipboard in a crowd. "Minding himself to go +afoot," says the apostle's companion. It would have made a precious +chapter in the Acts of the Apostles had the author of that book been able +to give his readers some of Paul's musings as he crossed the Troad on +foot that day. But in the absence of Paul's musings we have here the +musings of a man whom Paul would not have shaken off had he foregathered +with him on that lonely road. For Standfast was in a deep and serious +muse mile after mile, when, who should step into the middle of his path +right before him but Madam Bubble with her body and her purse and her +bed? Now, had this hungry howlet of a pilgrim been at that moment in any +other but a musing mood of mind, he had to a certainty sold himself, soul +and body, Celestial City and all, to that impudent slut. But, as He +would have it who overrules Madam Bubble's descents, and all things, +Standfast was at that moment in one of his most musing moods, and all her +smiles and all her offers fell flat and poor upon him. Cultivate +Standfast's mood of mind, my brethren. Walk a good deal alone. Strike +across country from time to time alone and have good long walks and talks +with yourself. And when you know that you are passing places of +temptation see that your thoughts, and even your imaginations, are well +occupied with solemn considerations about the certain issue of such and +such temptations; and then, to you, as to Standfast, + + "The arrow seen beforehand slacks its flight." + +2. But, musing alone, the arrow seen beforehand, and all, Standfast +would have been a lost man on that lonely road that day had he not +instantly betaken himself to his knees. And it was while Standfast was +still on his knees that the ascending pilgrims heard that concerned and +solemn noise a little ahead of them. Did you ever suddenly come across a +man on his knees? Did you ever surprise a man at prayer as Greatheart +and his companions surprised Standfast? I do not ask, Did you ever enter +a room and find a family around their morning or evening altar? We have +all done that. And it left its own impression upon us. But did you ever +spring a surprise upon a man on his knees alone and in broad daylight? I +did the other day. It was between eleven and twelve o'clock in the +forenoon when I asked a clerk if his master was in. Yes, he said, and +opened his master's door. When, before I was aware, I had almost fallen +over a man on his knees and with his face in his hands. "I pray thee," +said Valiant-for-truth, "tell us what it was that drew thee to thy knees +even now. Was it that some special mercy laid its obligations on thee, +or how?" I did not say that exactly to my kneeling friend, though it was +on the point of my tongue to say it. My dear friend, I knew, had his own +difficulties, though he was not exactly as poor as a howlet. And it +might have been about some of his investments that had gone out of joint +that he went that forenoon to Him who had said that He would help. Or, +like the author of the _Christian Perfection_ and _The Spirit of Prayer_, +it was the sixth hour of the day, and he may have gone to his knees for +his clerks, or for his boys at school, or for himself and for the man in +the same business with himself right across the street. I knew that my +friend had the charming book at home in which such counsels as these +occur: "If masters were thus to remember their servants, beseeching God +to bless them, letting no day pass without a full performance of this +devotion, the benefit would be as great to themselves as to their +servants." And perhaps my friend, after setting his clerks their several +tasks for the day, was now asking grace of God for each one of them that +they might not be eye-servants and men-pleasers, but the servants of +Christ doing the will of God from the heart. Or, again, he may have read +in that noble book this passage: "If a father were daily to make some +particular prayer to God that He would please to inspire his children +with true piety, great humility, and strict temperance, what could be +more likely to make the father himself become exemplary in these +virtues?" Now, my friend (who can tell?) may just that morning have lost +his temper with his son; or he may last night have indulged himself too +much in eating, or in drinking, or in debate, or in detraction; and that +may have made it impossible for him to fix his whole mind on his office +work that morning. Or, just to make another guess, when he opened the +book I had asked him to buy and read, he may have lighted on this +heavenly passage: "Lastly, if all people when they feel the first +approaches of resentment or envy or contempt towards others; or if in all +little disagreements and misunderstandings whatever they should have +recourse at such times to a more particular and extraordinary +intercession with God for such persons as had roused their envy, +resentment, or discontent--this would be a certain way to prevent the +growth of all uncharitable tempers." You may think that I am taking a +roundabout way of accounting for my friend's so concerned attitude at +twelve o'clock that business day; but the whole thing seemed to me so +unusual at such a time and in such a place that I was led to such guesses +as these to account for it. In so guessing I see now that I was +intruding myself into matters I had no business with; but all that day I +could not keep my mind off my blushing friend. For, like Mr. Standfast, +my dear friend blushed as he stood up and offered me the chair he had +been kneeling at. "But, why, did you see me?" said Mr. Standfast. "Yes, +I did," quoth the other, "and with all my heart I was glad at the sight." +"And what did you think?" said Mr. Standfast. + +3. "Was it," asked Valiant-for-truth, in a holy curiosity, "was it some +special mercy that brought thee to thy knees even now?" Yes; Valiant-for- +truth had exactly hit it. Gracious wits, like great wits, jump together. +"Yes," confessed Standfast, "I continue to give thanks for my great +deliverance." My brethren, you all pray importunately in your time of +sore trouble. Everybody does that. But do you feel an obligation, like +Standfast, to abide still on your knees long after your trouble is past? +Nature herself will teach us to pray; but it needs grace, and great grace +continually renewed, to teach us to praise, and to continue all our days +to praise. How we once prayed, ay, as earnestly, and as concernedly, and +as careless as to who should see or hear us as Standfast himself! How +some of us here to-night used to walk across a whole country all the time +praying! How we hoodwinked people in order to get away from them to pray +for twenty miles at a time all by ourselves! Under that bush--it still +stands to mark the spot; in that wood, long since cut down into ploughed +land--we could show our children the spot to this day where we prayed, +till a miracle was wrought in our behalf. Yes, till God sent from above +and took us as He never took a psalmist, and set our feet upon a still +more wonderful rock. How He, yes, HE, with His own hand cut the cords, +broke the net, and set us free! Come, all ye that fear God! we then +said, and said it with all sincerity too. And yet, how have we forgotten +what He did for our soul? We start like a guilty thing surprised when we +think how long it is since we had a spell of thanksgiving. Shame on us! +What treacherous hearts we have! What short memories we have! How soon +we forgive ourselves, and so forget the forgiveness of our God! Brethren, +let us still lay plans for praise as we used to do for prayer. If our +friends will go out with us, let us at least insist on walking home +alone. Let us say with Paul that we get sick at sea; and, besides, that +we have some calls to make and some small accounts to settle before we +leave the country. Tell them not to wait dinner for us. And then let us +take plenty of time. Let us stop at all our old stations and call back +all our old terrors; let us repeat aloud our old psalms--the +twenty-fifth, the fifty-first, the hundred and third, and the hundred and +thirtieth. We used to terrify people with our prayers as Standfast +terrified the young pilgrims that day; let us surprise and delight them +now with our psalms of thanksgiving. For, with all our disgraceful +ingratitude in the past, if William Law is right, we are even yet not far +from being great saints, if he is not wrong when he asks: "Would you know +who is the greatest saint in the world? It is not he who prays most or +fasts most; it is not he who gives most alms, or is most eminent for +temperance, chastity, or justice. But it is he who is most thankful to +God, and who has a heart always ready to praise God. This is the +perfection of all virtues. Joy in God and thankfulness to God is the +highest perfection of a divine and holy life." Well, then, what an +endless cause of joy and thankfulness have we! Let us acknowledge it, +and henceforth employ it; and we shall, please God, even yet be counted +as not low down but high up among the saints and the servants of God. + +4. Christiana said many kind and wise and beautiful things to all the +other pilgrims before she entered the river, but it was observed that +though she sent for Mr. Standfast, she said not one word to him when he +came; she just gave him her ring. "The touch is human and affecting," +says Mr. Louis Stevenson, in his delightful paper on Bagster's "Bunyan," +in the _Magazine of Art_. By the way, do you who are lovers of Bunyan +literature know that remarkable and delicious paper? The Messrs. Bagster +should secure that paper and should issue an _edition de luxe_ of their +neglected "Bunyan," with Mr. Stevenson's paper for a preface and +introduction. Bagster's "Illustrated Bunyan," with an introduction on +the illustrations by Mr. Louis Stevenson, if I am not much mistaken, +would sell by the thousand. + +5. Lord Rosebery knows books and loves books, and he has called +attention to the surpassing beauty of the English in the deathbed scenes +of the _Pilgrim's Progress_. And every lover of pure, tender, and noble +English must, like the Foreign Secretary, have all those precious pages +by heart. Were it not that we all have a cowardly fear at death +ourselves, and think it wicked and cruel even to hint at his approaching +death even to a fast-dying man, we would never let any of our friends lie +down on his sick-bed without having a reassuring and victorious page of +the _Pilgrim_ read to him every day. If the doctors would allow me, I +would have these heavenly pages reprinted in sick-bed type for all my +people. But I am afraid at the doctors. And thus one after another of +my people passes away without the fortification and the foretaste that +the deathbeds of Christian, and Christiana, and Hopeful, and Mr. Fearing, +and Mr. Feeble-mind, and Mr. Honest, and Mr. Standfast would most surely +have given to them. Especially the deathbed, if I must so call it, of +Mr. Standfast. But as Christiana said nothing that could be heard to Mr. +Standfast about his or her latter end, but just looked into his eyes and +gave him her ring, so I may not be able to say all that is in my heart +when your doctor is standing close by. But you will understand what I +would fain say, will you not? You will remember, and will have this +heavenly book read to you alternately with your Bible, will you not? Even +the most godless doctor will give way to you when you tell him that you +know as well as he does just how it is with you, and that you are to have +your own way for the last time. I know a doctor who first forbade her +minister and her family to tell his patient that she was dying, and at +the same time told them to take away from her bedside all such alarming +books as the _Pilgrim's Progress_ and the _Saint's Rest_, and to read to +her a reassuring chapter out of _Old Mortality_ and _Pickwick_. + +It will, no doubt, put the best-prepared of us into a deep muse, as it +put Standfast, when we are first told that we must at once prepare +ourselves for a change of life. But I for one would not for worlds miss +that solemn warning, and that last musing-time. It will all be just as +my Master pleases; but if it is within His will I shall till then +continue to petition Him that I may have a passage over the river like +the passage of Standfast. Or, if that may not now be, then, at least, a +musing-time like his. The post from the Celestial City brought Mr. +Standfast's summons "open" in his hand. And thus it was that Standfast's +translation did not take him by surprise. Standfast was not plunged +suddenly and without warning into the terrible river. He took the open +summons into big own hand and read it out like a man. After which he +went, as his manner was, for a good while into a deep and undisturbed +muse. As soon as he came out of his muse he would have Greatheart to be +sent for. And then their last conversation together proceeded. And no +one interfered with the two brave-hearted men. No one interposed, or +said that Greatheart would exhaust or alarm Standfast, or would +injuriously hasten his end. Not only so, but all the way till he was +half over the river, Standfast kept up his own side of the noble +conversation. And it is his side of that half-earthly, whole-heavenly +conversation that I would like to have put into suitable type and +scattered broadcast over all our sick-beds. + +6. "Tell me," says Valdes to Julia in his _Christian Alphabet_, "have +you ever crossed a deep river by a ford?" "Yes," says Julia, "I have, +many times." "And have you remarked how that by looking upon the water +it seemed as though your head swam, so that, if you had not assisted +yourself, either by closing your eyes, or by fixing them on the opposite +shore, you would have fallen into the water in great danger of drowning?" +"Yes, I have noticed that." "And have you seen how by keeping always for +your object the view of the land that lies on the other side, you have +not felt that swimming of the head, and so have suffered no danger of +drowning?" "I have noticed that too," replied Julia. Now, it was +exactly this same way of looking, not at the black and swirling river, +but at the angelic conduct waiting for him at the further bank, and then +at the open gate of the Celestial City,--it was this that kept +Standfast's head so steady and his heart like a glowing coal while he +stood and talked in the middle of the giddy stream. You would have +thought it was Paul himself talking to himself on the road to Assos. For +I defy even the apostle himself to have talked better or more boldly to +himself even on the solid midday road than Standfast talked to himself in +the bridgeless river. "I see myself," he said, "at the end of my journey +now. My toilsome days are all ended. I am going now to see that head +that was crowned with thorns, and that face that was spat upon for me. I +loved to hear my Lord spoken of, and wherever I have seen the print of +His shoe in the earth I have coveted to set my foot also. His name has +been to me as a civet-box; yea, sweeter than all perfumes. His word I +did use to gather for my food, and for antidotes against my faintings. He +has held me, and I have kept me from my iniquities. Yea, my steps He has +strengthened in my way." Now, while Standfast was thus in discourse his +countenance changed, his strong man bowed down under him, and after he +had said "Take me!" he ceased to be seen of them. But how glorious it +was to see how the open region was now filled with horses and chariots, +with trumpeters and pipers, and with singers and players on stringed +instruments, all to welcome the pilgrims as they went up and followed one +another in at the beautiful gate of the city! + + + + +MADAM BUBBLE + + + "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity."--_Solomon_. + + "I have overcome the world."--_Our Lord_. + + "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. For + all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, + and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And + the world passeth away, and the lust thereof."--_John_. + + "This bubble world."--_Quarles_. + +Madam Bubble's portrait was first painted by the Preacher. And he +painted her portrait with extraordinary insight, boldness, and +truthfulness. There is that in the Preacher's portrait of Madam Bubble +which only comes of the artist having mixed his colours, as Milman says +that Tacitus mixed his ink, with resentment and with remorse. Out of His +reading of Solomon and Moses and the Prophets on this same subject, as +well as out of His own observation and experience, conflict and conquest, +our Lord added some strong and deep and inward touches of His own to that +well-known picture, and then named it by the New Testament name of the +World. And then, after Him, His longest-lived disciple set forth the +same mother and her three daughters under the three names that still +stick to them to this day,--the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, +and the pride of life. But it was reserved for John Bunyan to fill up +and to finish those outlines of Scripture and to pour over the whole work +his own depth and strength of colour, till, altogether, Madam Bubble +stands out as yet another masterpiece of our dreamer's astonishing +genius. Let us take our stand before this heaving canvas, then, till we +have taken attentive note of some of John Bunyan's inimitable touches and +strokes and triumphs of truth and art. "One in very pleasant attire, but +old . . . This woman is a witch . . . I am the mistress of the world, she +said, and men are made happy by me . . . A tall, comely dame, something +of a swarthy complexion." In the newly discovered portrait of a woman, +by Albert Durer, one of the marks of its genuineness is the way that the +great artist's initials A. D. are pencilled in on the embroidery of the +lady's bodice. And you will note in this gentlewoman's open dress also +how J. B. is inextricably woven in. "She wears a great purse by her side +also, and her hand is often in her purse fingering her money. Yea, this +is she that has bought off many a man from a pilgrim's life after he had +fairly begun it. She is a bold and an impudent slut also, for she will +talk with any man. If there be one cunning to make money in any place, +she will speak well of him from house to house . . . She has given it out +in some places also that she is a goddess, and therefore some do actually +worship her . . . She has her times and open places of cheating, and she +will say and avow it that none can show a good comparable to hers. And +thus she has brought many to the halter, and ten thousand times more to +hell. None can tell of the mischief that she does. She makes variance +betwixt rulers and subjects, betwixt parents and children, 'twixt +neighbour and neighbour, 'twixt a man and his wife, 'twixt a man and +himself, 'twixt the flesh and the heart." And so on in the great +original. "Had she stood by all this while," said Standfast, whose eyes +were still full of her, "you could not have set Madam Bubble more amply +before me, nor have better described her features." "He that drew her +picture was a good limner," said Mr. Honest, "and he that so wrote of her +said true". + +1. "I am the mistress of this world," says Madam Bubble. And though all +the time she is a bold and impudent slut, yet it is the simple truth that +she does sit as a queen over this world and over the men of this world. +For Madam Bubble has a royal family like all other sovereigns. She has a +court of her own, too, with its ball-room presentations and its birthday +honours. She has a cabinet council also, and a bar and a bench with +their pleadings and their decisions. Far more than all that, she has a +church which she has established and of which she is the head; and a +faith also of which she is the defender. She has a standing army also +for the extension and the protection of her dominions. She levies taxes, +too, and sends out ambassadors, and makes treaties, and forms offensive +and defensive alliances. But what a bubble all this World is to him +whose eyes have at last been opened to see the hollowness and the +heartlessness of it all! For all its pursuits and all its possessions, +from a child's rattle to a king's sceptre, all is one great bubble. +Wealth, fame, place, power; art, science, letters; politics, churches, +sacraments, and scriptures--all are so many bubbles in Madam Bubble's +World. This wicked enchantress, if she does not find all these things +bubbles already, by one touch of her evil wand she makes them so. She +turns gold into dross, God into an idle name, and His Word into words +only; unless when in her malice she turns it into a fruitful ground of +debate and contention; a ground of malice and hatred and ill-will. Vanity +of vanities; all is vanity and vexation of spirit. Still, she sits a +queen and a goddess to a great multitude: to all men, to begin with. And, +like a goddess, she sheds abroad her spirit in her people's hearts and +lifts up upon them for a time the light of her countenance. + +2. "I am the mistress of the world," she says, "and men are made happy +by me."--I would like to see one of them. I have seen many men to whom +Madam Bubble had said that if they would be ruled by her she would make +them great and happy. But though I have seen not a few who have believed +her and let themselves be ruled by her, I have never yet seen one happy +man among them.--The truth is, Madam Bubble is not able to make men happy +even if she wished to do it. She is not happy herself, and she cannot +dispense to others what she does not possess. And, yet, such are her +sorceries that, while her old dupes die in thousands every day, new dupes +are born to her every day in still greater numbers. New dupes who run to +the same excess of folly with her that their fathers ran; new dupes led +in the same mad dance after Madam Bubble and her three daughters. But, +always, and to all men, what a bubble both the mother and all her +daughters are! How they all make promises like their lying mother, and +how, like her, they all lead men, if not to the halter and to hell, as +Greatheart said, yet to a life of vanity and to a death of disappointment +and despair! What bubbles of empty hopes both she and her three children +blow up in the brains of men! What pictures of untold happiness they +paint in the imaginations of men! What pleasures, what successes in +life, what honours and what rewards she pledges herself to see bestowed! +"She has her times and open places of cheating," said one who knew her +and all her ways well. And when men and women are still young and +inexperienced, that is one of her great cheating times. At some seasons +of the year, and in some waters, to the fisherman's surprise and +confusion, the fish will sometimes take his bare hook; a bit of a red rag +is a deadly bait. And Madam Bubble's poorest and most perfunctory +busking is quite enough for the foolish fish she angles for. And not in +our salad days only, when we are still green in judgment, but even to +grey hairs, this wicked witch continues to entrap us to our ruin. Love, +in all its phases and in all its mixtures, first deludes the very young; +and then place, and power, and fame, and money are the bait she busks for +the middle-aged and the old; and always with the same bubble end. The +whole truth is that without God, the living and ever-present God, in all +ages of it and in all parts and experiences of it, our human life is one +huge bubble. A far-shining, high-soaring bubble; but sooner or later +seen and tasted to be a bubble--a deceit-filled, poison-filled +bubble.--Happy by her! All men happy by her! The impudent slut! + +3. Another thing about this slut is this, that "she will talk with any +man." She makes up to us and makes eyes at us just as if we were free to +accept and return her three offers. And still she talks to us and offers +us the same things she offered to Standfast till, to escape her and her +offers, he betook himself to his knees. Nay, truth to tell, after she +had deceived us and ensnared us till we lay in her net cursing both her +and ourselves, so bold and so impudent and so persistent is this +temptress slut, and such fools and idiots are we, that we soon lay our +eyes on her painted beauty again and our heads in her loathsome lap; our +heads on that block over which the axe hangs by an angry hair. "She will +talk with any man." No doubt; but, then, it takes two to make a talk, +and the sad thing is that there are few men among us so wise, so +steadfast, and so experienced in her ways that they will not on occasion +let Madam Bubble talk her talk to them, and talk back again to her. The +oldest saint, the oftenest sold and most dearly redeemed sinner, needs to +suspect himself to the end, till he is clear out of Madam Bubble's +enchanted ground and for ever over that river of deliverance which shall +sweep Madam Bubble and all her daughters into the dead sea for ever. + + "The grey-haired saint may fail at last, + The surest guide a wanderer prove; + Death only binds us fast + To the bright shore of love." + +4. "She highly commends the rich," the guide goes on about Madam Bubble, +"and if there be one cunning to get money in any place she will speak +well of him from house to house." "The world," says Faber, "is not +altogether matter, nor yet altogether spirit. It is not man only, nor +Satan only, nor is it exactly sin. It is an infection, an inspiration, +an atmosphere, a life, a colouring matter, a pageantry, a fashion, a +taste, a witchery. None of all these names suit it, and all of them suit +it. Meanwhile its power over the human creation is terrific, its +presence ubiquitous, its deceitfulness incredible. It can find a home +under every heart beneath the poles. It is wider than the catholic +church, and it is masterful, lawless, and intrusive within it. We are +all living in it, breathing it, acting under its influence, being cheated +by its appearances, and unwarily admitting its principles." Let young +ministers who wish to preach to their people on the World--after studying +what the Preacher, and the Saviour, and John, and John Bunyan say about +the World,--still read Faber's powerful chapter in his _Creator and +Creature_. Yes; Madam Bubble finds a home for herself in every heart +beneath the poles. The truth is Madam Bubble has no home, as she has no +existence, but in human hearts. And all that Solomon, and our Saviour, +and John, and John Bunyan, and Frederick Faber say about the world and +about Madam Bubble they really say about the heart of man. It is we, you +and I, my brethren, who so highly commend the rich. It is we ourselves +here who speak well from house to house of him whose father or whose self +has been cunning to get money. We either speak well or ill of them. We +either are sick with envy at them, or we fawn upon them and fall down +before them. How men rise in our esteem in the degree that their money +increases! With what reverence and holy awe we look up at them as if +they were gods and the sons of gods! They become more than mortal men to +our reverent imaginations. How happy, how all but blessed they must be! +we say to ourselves. Within those park gates, under those high towers, +in that silver-mounted carriage, surrounded with all those liveried +servants, and loved and honoured by all those arriving and leaving +guests--what happiness that rich man must have! We are either eaten up +of lean-eyed envy of this and that rich man, or we positively worship +them as other men worship God and His saints. Yes; Madam Bubble is our +very mother. She conceived us and she suckled us. We were brought up in +her nurture and admonition. We learned her Catechism, and her shrine is +in our heart to-night. Like her, if only a pilgrim is poor, we scorn +him. We will not know him. But if there be any one, pilgrim or no, +cunning to get money, we honour him, and we claim him as our kindred and +relation, our acquaintance and our friend. We will speak often of him as +such from house to house. Just see if we will not. There is room in our +hearts, Madam Bubble, there is room in our hearts for thee! + +5. "She loves them most that think best of her." But, surely, surely, +the guide goes quite too far in blaming and being hard upon poor Madam +Bubble for that? For, to give her fair play, she is not at all alone in +that. Is the guide himself wholly above that? Do we not all do that? Is +there one in ten, is there one in a thousand, who hates and humiliates +himself because his love of men and women goes up or down just as they +think of him? Yes; Greatheart is true to his great name in his whole +portrait of Madam Bubble also, and nowhere more true than in this present +feature. For when any man comes to have any true greatness in his +heart--how he despises and detests himself as he finds himself out in not +only claiming kindred and acquaintance with the rich and despising and +denying the poor; but, still more, in loving or hating other men just as +they love or hate him! The world loves her own. Yes; but he who has +been taken out of the world, and who has had the world taken out of him, +he loves--he strives to love, he goes to his knees every day he lives to +love--those who not only do not think well of him, but who both think ill +of him and speak ill of him. "Humility," says William Law, "does not +consist in having a worse opinion of ourselves than we deserve, or in +abasing ourselves lower than we really are. But as all virtue is founded +in truth, so humility is founded in a true and just sense of our +weakness, misery, and sin. He who rightly feels and lives in this sense +of his condition lives in humility. And, it may be added, when our +hearts are wholly clothed with humility we shall be prompt to approve the +judgment and to endorse the sentence of those who think and speak the +least good of us and the most evil." + +6. "'Twas she," so the guide at last wound up, "that set Absalom against +his father, and Jeroboam against his master. 'Twas she that persuaded +Judas to sell his Lord, and that prevailed with Demas to forsake the +godly pilgrim's life. None can tell all the mischief that Madam Bubble +does. She makes variance between rulers and subjects, between parents +and children, 'twixt neighbour and neighbour, 'twixt a man and his wife, +'twixt a man and himself, 'twixt the flesh and the heart." Now, I shall +leave that last indictment and its lessons and its applications to +yourselves, my brethren. You will get far more good out of this +accumulated count against Madam Bubble if you explain it, and open it up, +and prove it, and illustrate it to yourselves. Explain, then, in what +way this sorceress set Absalom against his father and Jeroboam against +his master. Point out in what way she makes variance between a ruler and +his subjects, and give illustrations. Put your finger on a parent and on +a child between whom there is variance at this moment on her account. +And, if you are that parent or that child, what have you done to remove +that variance? Name two neighbours that to your knowledge Madam Bubble +has come between; and say what you have done to be a peacemaker there. +Set down what you would say to a man and his wife so as to put them on +their guard against Madam Bubble ever coming in between them. And, last +and best of all, point out to yourself at what times and in what ways +this wicked witch tries to make variance between God's Holy Spirit +striving within you and your own evil heart still strong within you. When +you are weary and sleepy and hungry as a howlet, and, Madam Bubble and +her three daughters make a ring round you, what do you do? Do you ever +take to your knees? Really and honestly, do you? When you find yourself +out looking with holy fear on a rich and lofty relation, and with +insufferable contempt on a poor and intrusive relation, by what name do +you call yourself? Write it down. And when she would fain put variance +between you and those who do not think well of you, what steps do you +take to foil her? Where and how do you get strength at that supreme +moment to think of others as you would have them think of you? "Oh," +said Standfast, "what a mercy it is that I did resist her! for to what +might she not have drawn me?" + + + + +GAIUS + + + "Gaius, mine host."--_Paul_. + +Goodman Gaius was the head of a hostel that stood on the side of the +highway well on to the Celestial City. The hostess of the hostel was no +more, and the old hostel-keeper did all her once well-done work and his +own proper work into the bargain. Every day he inspected the whole house +with his own eyes, down even to the kitchen and the scullery. The good +woman had left our host an only daughter; but, "Keep her as much out of +sight as is possible," she said, and so fell asleep. And Gaius +remembered his wife's last testament every day, till none of the hostel +customers knew that there was so much as a young hostess in all the +house. "Yes, gentlemen," replied the old innkeeper. "Yes, come in. It +is late, but I take you for true men, for you must know that my house is +kept open only for such." So he took the large pilgrim party to their +several apartments with his own eyes, and then set about a supper for +those so late arrivals. Stamping with his foot, he brought up the cook +with the euphonious and eupeptic name, and that quick-witted domestic +soon had a supper on the table that would have made a full man's mouth +water. "The sight of all this," said Matthew, as the under-cook laid the +cloth and the trenchers, and set the salt and the bread in order--"the +sight of this cloth and of this forerunner of a supper begetteth in me a +greater appetite to my food than I thought I had before." So supper came +up; and first a heave-shoulder and a wave-breast were set on the table +before them, in order to show that they must begin their meal with prayer +and praise to God. These two dishes were very fresh and good, and all +the travellers did eat heartily well thereof. The next was a bottle of +wine red as blood. So Gaius said to them, "Drink freely; this is the +juice of the true vine that makes glad the heart of God and man." And +they did drink and were very merry. The next was a dish of milk well +crumbed. At the sight of which Gaius said, "Let the boys have that, that +they may grow thereby." And so on, dish after dish, till the nuts came +with the recitations and the riddles and the saws and the stories over +the nuts. Thus the happy party sat talking till the break of day. + +1. Now, it is natural to remark that the first thing about a host is his +hospitality. And that, too, whether our host is but the head of a hostel +like Goodman Gaius, or the head of a well-appointed private house like +Gaius's neighbour, Mr. Mnason. The first and the last thing about a host +is his hospitality. "Say little and do much" is the example and the +injunction to all our housekeepers that Rabban Shammai draws out of the +eighteenth of Genesis. "Be like your father Abraham," he says, "on the +plains of Mamre, who only promised bread and water, but straightway set +Sarah to knead three measures of her finest meal, while he ran to the +herd and fetched a calf tender and good, and stood by the three men while +they did eat butter and milk under the tree. Make thy Thorah an +ordinance: say little and do much: and receive every man with a pleasant +expression of countenance." Now, this was exactly what Gaius our goodman +did that night, with one exception, which we shall be constrained to +attend to afterwards. "It is late," he said, "so we cannot conveniently +go out to seek food; but such as we have you shall be welcome to, if that +will content." At the same time Taste-that-which-is-good soon had a +supper sent up to the table fit for a prince: a supper of six courses at +that time in the morning, so that the sun was already in the sky when Old +Honest closed his casement. + +"Dining in company is a divine institution," says Mr. Edward White, in +his delightful _Minor Moralities of Life_. "Let Soyer's art be honoured +among all men," he goes on. "Cookery distinguishes mankind from the +beasts that perish. Happy is the woman whose daily table is the result +of forethought. Her husband shall rise up and call her blessed. It is +piteous when the culinary art is neglected in our young women's +education. Let them, as St. Peter says, imitate Sarah. Let them see how +that venerable princess went quickly to her kneading-trough and oven and +prepared an extempore collation of cakes and pilau for the angels. How +few ladies, whether Gentiles or Jewesses, could do the like in the +present day!" + +2. The wistful and punctilious attention that Goodman Gaius paid to each +individual guest of his was a fine feature in his munificent hospitality. +He made every one who crossed his doorstep, down even to Mr. Fearing, +feel at once at home, such was his exquisite as well as his munificent +hospitality. "Come, sir," he said, clapping that white-faced and +trembling pilgrim on the shoulder, "come, sir, be of good cheer, you are +welcome to me and to my house; and what thou hast a mind to, that call +for freely: for what thou wouldst have my servants will do for thee, and +they will do it for thee with a ready mind." All the same, for a long +time Mr. Fearing was mortally afraid of the servants. He would as soon +have thought of stamping his foot for a duchess to come up as for any of +Gaius's serving-maids. He was afraid to make any noise in his room lest +all the house should hear it. He was afraid to touch anything in the +room lest it should fall and be broken. We ourselves, with all our +assumed ease and elaborate abandon, are often afraid to ring our bell +even in an inn. Mr. Fearing would as soon have pulled the tail of a +rattlesnake. But before their sojourn was over, the Guide was amazed at +Mr. Fearing, for that hare-hearted pilgrim would be doing things in the +house that he himself would scarcely do who had been in the house a +thousand times. It was Gaius's exuberant heartiness that had demoralised +Mr. Fearing and made him almost too forward even for a wayside inn. In +little things also Gaius, mine host, showed his sensitive and solicitous +hospitality. We all know housekeepers, not to say innkeepers, and not +otherwise ungenerous housekeepers either who will grudge us a +sixpennyworth of sticks and coals in a cold night, and that, too, in a +room furnished to overflowing by Morton Brothers or the Messrs. Maple. We +take a candlestick and a dozen candles with us in the boot of the +carriage when we wish to read or write late into the night in that great +house. Another housekeeper, who would give you her only daughter with +her wealthy dowry, will sometimes be seen by all in her house to grudge +you a fresh cup of afternoon tea when you drop in to see her and her +daughter. She says to herself that it is to spare the servants the +stairs; but, all the time, under the stairs, the servants are blushing +for the sometimes unaccountable stinginess of their unusually munificent +mistress. I shall give you "line upon line, precept upon precept, here a +little and there a little" of Aristotle upon munificence in little things +till you come up to his pagan standard. "There is a real greatness," he +says, "even in the way that some men will buy a toy to a child. Even in +the smallest matters the munificent man will act munificently!" As +Gaius, mine host, munificently did. + +3. Speaking of children, what a night of entertainment good old Gaius +gave the children of the pilgrim party! "Let the boys have the crumbed +milk," he gave orders. "Butter and honey shall they eat," he exclaimed +over them as that brimming dish came up. "This was our Lord's dish when +He was a child," he said to the mother of the boys, "that He might know +to refuse the evil and to choose the good." Then they brought up a dish +of apples, and they were very good-tasted fruit. Then said Matthew, "May +we eat apples, since they were such by and with which the serpent +beguiled our first mother?" Then said Gaius, + + "Apples were they by which we were beguiled, + Yet sin, not apples, hath our souls defiled. + Apples forbid, if eat, corrupt the blood. + To eat such, when commanded, does us good. + Drink of His flagons then, thou Church, His Dove, + And eat His apples who are sick of love." + +Then said Matthew, "I make the scruple because I awhile since was sick +with eating of fruit." "Forbidden fruit," said the host, "will make you +sick, but not what our Lord hath tolerated." While they were thus +talking they were presented with another dish, and it was a dish of nuts. +Then said some at the table, "Nuts spoil tender teeth, especially the +teeth of children," which when Gaius heard, he said, + + "Hard texts are nuts (I will not call them cheaters) + Whose shells do keep their kernels from the eaters; + Ope then the shells and you shall have the meat; + They here are brought for you to crack and eat." + +Then Samuel whispered to his mother and said, "Mother, this is a very +good man's house; let us stay here a good while before we go any +farther." The which Gaius the host overhearing, said, "With a very good +will, my child." + +4. Widower as old Gaius was, and never for a single hour forgot that he +was, there was a certain sweet and stately gallantry awakened in his +withered old heart at the sight of Christiana and Mercy, and especially +at the sight of Matthew and Mercy when they were seen together. He seems +to have fallen almost in love with that aged matron, as he called her, +and the days of his youth came back to him as he studied the young +damsel, who was to her as a daughter. And this set the loquacious old +innkeeper upon that famous oration about women which every man who has a +mother, or a wife, or a sister, or a daughter has by heart. And from +that he went on to discourse on the great advantages of an early +marriage. He was not the man, nor was he speaking to a mother who was +the woman, ever to become a vulgar and coarse-minded matchmaker; at the +same time, he liked to see Matthew and Mercy sent out on a message +together, leaving it to nature and to grace to do the rest. The pros and +cons of early marriage were often up at his hearty table, but he always +debated, and Gaius was a great debater, that true hospitality largely +consisted in throwing open the family circle to let young people get well +acquainted with one another in its peace and sweetness. And Gaius both +practised what he preached, and at the same time endorsed his watchful +wife's last testament, when he gave his daughter Phebe to James, +Christiana's second son, and thus was left alone, poor old Gaius, when +the happy honeymoon party started upward from his hostel door. + +5. Their next host was one Mr. Mnason, a Cyprusian by nation, and an old +disciple. "How far have you come to-day?" he asked. "From the house of +Gaius our friend," they said. "I promise you," said he, "you have gone a +good stitch; you may well be weary; sit down." So they sat down. "Our +great want a while since," said Old Honest, "was harbour and good +company, and now I hope we have both." "For harbour," said the host, +"you see what it is, but for good company that will appear in the trial." +After they were a little rested Old Honest again asked his host if there +were any store of good people in that town; and, "How," he said, "shall +we do to see some of them? For the sight of good men to them that are +going on pilgrimage is like to the appearing of the moon and stars to +them that are sailing upon the seas." Then Mr. Mnason stamped with his +foot and his daughter Grace came up, when he sent her out for five of his +friends in the town, saying that he had a guest or two in his house at +present to whom he would like to introduce them. + +Now, this is another of the good qualities of a good host, to know the +best and the most suitable people in the town, and to be on such terms +with them that on short notice they will step across to help to entertain +such travellers as had come to Mr. Mnason's table. And it is an +excellent thing to be sure that when we are so invited we shall not only +get a good dinner, but also, as good "kitchen" with our dinner, good +company and good conversation. It is nothing short of a fine art to +gather together and to seat suitably beside one another good and suitable +people as Mr. and Miss Mnason did in their hospitable house that +afternoon. And then, as to the talk: let the host and the hostess +introduce the guests, and then let the guests introduce their own topics. +And as far as possible, in a city and a day like this, let our topics be +books rather than people. And let the books be the books that the guests +have read rather than those that the host and the hostess have read. +Books are a fine subject for a talk at table. Only, let great readers +order their learned and literary talk so as not to lead the less learned +into temptation. There is no finer exercise of fine feeling than to be +able to carry on a conversation about matters that other people present +are ignorant of, and at the same time to interest them, to set them at +ease, and to make them forget both you and themselves. I had a letter +the other day from an English Church clergyman, in which he tells me that +his bishop is coming this month to his vicarage for a kind of visitation +and retreat, and that they are to have William Law's _Characters and +Characteristics_ read aloud to them when the bishop and the assembled +clergy are at their meals. For my part, I would rather hear a good all- +round talk on that book by the bishop and his clergy after they had all +read the book over and over again at home. But such readings at +assembled meals have all along been a feature of the best fraternal life +in the Church of England and in some of the sister churches. + +6. Now, after dining and supping repeatedly with garrulous old Gaius, +and with the all-but-silent Mr. Mnason, I have come home ruminating again +and again on this--that a good host, the best host, lets his guests talk +while he attends to the table. If the truth may even be whispered to +one's-self about a table that one has just left, Gaius did his best to +spoil his good supper by his own over-garrulity. It was good talk that +he entertained his waiting guests with, but we may have too much of a +good thing. His oration in praise of women was an excellent oration, had +it been delivered in another house than his own; and, say, when he was +asked to give the health of Christiana, or of Matthew the bridegroom and +Mercy the bride, it would then have been perfect; but not in his own +house, and not when his guests were waiting for their supper. On the +other hand, you should have seen that perfect gentleman, Mr. Mnason. For +that true old Christian and old English gentleman never once opened his +mouth after he had set his guests a-talking. He was too busy watching +when any man's dish was again empty. He was too much delighted to see +that every one of his guests was having his punctual share of the supper, +and at the same time his full share of the talk. Mr. Fearing's small +voice was far more pleasant to Mr. Mnason than his own voice was in his +own best story. As I opened my own door the other night after supping +with Mr. and Miss Mnason, I said to myself--One thing I have again seen +and learned to-night, and that is, that a host, and still more a hostess, +should talk less at their own table than their most silent, most bashful, +and most backward guest. "Make this an ordinance for thee," said Rabban +Shammai to his sons in the law; "receive all thy guests with a pleasant +expression of countenance, and then say little and do much." + + + + +CHRISTIAN + + + "The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch."--_Luke_. + + "Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian."--_King Agrippa_. + + "Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from + iniquity."--_Paul_. + +All the other personages in the Pilgrim's Progress come and go; they all +ascend the stage for a longer or shorter time, and then pass off the +stage and so pass out of our sight; but Christian in the First Part, and +Christiana in the Second Part, are never for a single moment out of our +sight. And, accordingly, we have had repeated occasion and opportunity +to learn many excellent lessons from the chief pilgrim's upward walk and +heavenly conversation. But so full and so rich are his life and his +character, that some very important things still remain to be collected +before we finally close his history. "Gather up the fragments that +nothing be lost," said our Lord, after His miraculous meal of multiplied +loaves and fishes with His disciples. And in like manner I shall now +proceed to gather up some of the remaining fragments of Christian's life +and character and experience. And I shall collect these fragments into +the three baskets of his book, his burden, and his sealed roll and +certificate. + +1. And first, a few things as to his book. "As I slept I dreamed, and +behold I saw a man clothed in rags standing in a certain place, with his +face from his own house, a book in his hand, and a great burden upon his +back. I looked and saw him open the book and read therein; and as he +read he wept and trembled; and not being able longer to contain he broke +out with a lamentable cry, saying, What shall I do?" We hear a great +deal in these advertising days, and not one word too much, about the +books that have influenced and gone largely to the making of our great +men; but Graceless, like John Bunyan, his biographer, was a man of but +one book. But, then, that book was the most influential of all books; it +was the Book of books; it was God's very own and peculiar Book. And +those of us who, like this man, have passed out of a graceless into a +gracious state will for ever remember how that same Book at that time +influenced us till it made us what we are and shall yet be. We read many +other good books at that epoch in our life, but it was the pure Bible +that we read and prayed over out of sight the most. We needed no +commentators or exegetes on our simple Bible in those days. The great +texts stood out to our eyes in those days as if they had been written +with a sunbeam; while all other books (and we read nothing but the best +books in those days) looked like twilight and rushlight beside our Bible. +In those immediate, direct, and intense days we would have satisfied +Wordsworth and Matthew Arnold themselves in the way we read our Bible +with our eye never off the object. The Four Last Things were ever before +us--death and judgment, heaven and hell. "O my dear wife," said +Graceless, "and you the children of my bowels, I your dear friend am in +myself undone by reason of a burden that lieth hard upon me; moreover, I +am for certain informed that this our city will be burned with fire from +heaven, in which fearful overthrow both myself, with thee my wife, and +you my sweet babes, shall miserably come to ruin, except (the which yet I +see not) some way of escape can be found whereby we may be delivered." He +would walk also solitarily in the fields, sometimes reading and sometimes +praying; and thus for some days he spent his time. Graceless at that +time and at that stage would have satisfied the exigent author of the +_Practical Treatise upon Christian Perfection_ where he says that "we are +too apt also to think that we have sufficiently read a book when we have +so read it as to know what it contains. This reading may be quite +sufficient as to many books; but as to the Bible we are not to think that +we have read it enough because we have often read and heard what it +teaches. We must read our Bible, not to know what it contains, but to +fill our hearts with the spirit of it." And, again, and on this same +point, "There is this unerring key to the right use of the Bible. The +Bible has only one intent, and that is to make a man know, resist, and +abhor the working of his fallen earthly nature, and to turn the faith, +hope, and longing desire of his heart to God; and therefore we are only +to read our Bibles with this view and to learn this one lesson from it . +. . The critic looks into his books to see how Latin and Greek authors +have used the words 'stranger' and 'pilgrim,' but the Christian, who +knows that man lives in labour and toil, in sickness and pain, in hunger +and thirst, in heat and cold among the beasts of the field, where evil +spirits like roaring lions seek to devour him--he only knows in what +truth and reality man is a poor stranger and a distressed pilgrim upon +the earth." John Bunyan read neither Plato nor Aristotle, but he read +David and Paul till he was the chief of sinners, and till he was first +the Graceless and then the Christian of his own next-to-the-Bible book. + +2. In the second place, and as to his burden. We are supplied with no +particulars as to the first beginnings, the gradual make-up, and at last +the terrible size of Christian's burden. What this pilgrim's youthful +life must have been in such a city as his native city was, and while he +was still a young man of such a name and such a character in such a city, +we are left to ourselves to think and consider. Graceless was his name +by nature, and his life was as his name and his nature were. Still, as I +have said, we have no detailed and particular account of his early life +when his burden was still day and night in the making up. How long into +your life were you graceless, my brother? And what kind of life did you +lead day and night before you were persuaded or alarmed, as the case may +have been with you, into being a Christian? What burdens do you carry on +your broken back to this day that were made up in the daylight or in the +darkness by your own hands in your early days? Were you early or were +you too late in your conversion? Or are you truly converted to God and +to salvation even yet? And are you at this moment still binding a burden +on your back that you shall never lay down on this side your grave--it +may be, not on this side your burning bed in hell? Ask yourselves all +that before God and before your own conscience, and make yourselves +absolutely sure that God at any rate is not mocked; and, therefore that +you, too, shall in the end reap exactly as you from the beginning have +sown. "How camest thou by thy burden at first?" asked Mr. +Worldly-Wiseman at the trembling pilgrim. "By reading this book in my +hand," he answered. And, in the long run, it is always the Bible that +best creates a sinner's burden, binds it on his back, and makes it so +terribly heavy to bear. Fear of death and judgment will sometimes make +up and bind on a sinner's burden; and sometimes the fear of man's +judgment on this side of death will do it. Fear of being found out in +some cases will make a man's secret sin far too heavy for him to bear. +The throne of public opinion is not a very white throne; at the same +time, it is a coarse forecast and a rough foretaste of the last judgment; +and the fear of it not seldom makes a man's burden simply intolerable to +him. Sometimes a great sinner's burden leads him to flight and outlawry; +sometimes to madness and self-murder; and sometimes, by the timeous and +sufficient grace of God, to the way of escape that our pilgrim took. +Tenderness of conscience, also, simple softness of heart and conscience, +will sometimes make a terrible burden out of what other men would call a +very light matter. Bind a burden on that iron pillar standing there, and +it will feel nothing and say nothing. But, bind the same burden on that +man in whose seat that dead pillar takes up a sitter's room, and he will +make all that are in the house hear his sighs and his groans. And lay an +act of sin--an evil word or evil work or evil thought--on one man among +us, and he will walk about the streets with as erect a head and as +smiling a countenance and as light a step as if he were an innocent +child; while, lay half as much on his neighbour, and it will so bruise +him to the earth that all men will take knowledge of him that he is a +miserable man. Our Lord could no doubt have carried His cross from the +hall of judgment to the hill-top without help had His back not been wet +with blood. What with a whole and an unwealed body, a well-rested and +well-nourished body, He could easily have carried, with His broken body +and broken heart He quite sank under. And so it is with His people. One +of His heart-broken, heart-bleeding people will sink down to death and +hell under a burden of sin and corruption that another of them will +scarcely feel or know or believe that it is there. Some sins again in +themselves, and by reason of several aggravations, are far more heavy to +bear than others, and by some sinners than others. I was reading Bishop +Andrewes to myself last night and came upon this pertinent passage. "Sin: +its measure, its harm, its scandal. Its quality: how often--how long. +The person by whom: his age, condition, state, enlightenment. Its +manner, motive, time, and place. The folly of it, the ingratitude of it, +the hardness of it, the presumptuousness of it. By heart, by mouth, by +deed. Against God, my neighbours, my own body. By knowledge, by +ignorance. Willingly and unwillingly. Of old and of late. In boyhood +and youth, in mature and old age. Things done once, repeated often, +hidden and open. Things done in anger, and from the lust of the flesh +and of the world. Before and after my call. Asleep by night and awake +by day. Things remembered and things forgotten. Through the fiery darts +of the enemy, through the unclean desires of the flesh--I have sinned +against Thee. Have mercy on me, O God, and forgive me!" That is the way +some men's burdens are made up to such gigantic proportions and then +bound on by such acute cords. That is the way that Lancelot Andrewes and +John Bunyan walked solitarily in the fields, sometimes reading and +sometimes praying, till the one of them put himself into his immortal +_Devotions_, and the other into his immortal _Grace Abounding_ and +_Pilgrim's Progress_. + +"Then I saw in my dream that Christian asked the Gatekeeper further if he +could not help him off with his burden that was upon his back, for as yet +he had not got rid of it, nor could he by any means get it off without +help. He told him, 'As to thy burden, be content to bear it until thou +comest to the place of deliverance, for there it will fall from off thy +back itself.' Now I saw in my dream that the highway up which Christian +was to go was fenced on either side with a wall, and that wall is +Salvation. Up this way, therefore, did burdened Christian run, but not +without great difficulty, because of the load on his back. He ran thus +till he came to a place somewhat ascending, and upon that place stood a +cross, and a little below in the bottom a sepulchre. So I saw in my +dream that just as Christian came up with the cross his burden loosed +from off his back, and began to tumble and so continued to do till it +came to the mouth of the sepulchre, where it fell in and I saw it no +more. Then was Christian glad and lightsome, and said with a merry +heart, 'He hath given me rest by His sorrow, and life by His death!'" + + "Blest Cross! blest Sepulchre! Blest rather be + The Man that there was put to shame for me." + +But, then, how it could be that this so happy man was scarcely a stone- +cast past the cross when he had begun again to burden himself with fresh +sin, and thus to disinter all his former sin? How a true pilgrim comes +to have so many burdens to bear, and that till he ceases to be any longer +a pilgrim,--a burden of guilt, a burden of corruption, and a burden of +bare creaturehood,--I must leave all that, and all the questions +connected with all that, for you all to think out and work out for +yourselves; and you will not say any morning on this earth, like Mrs. +Timorous, that you have little to do. + +3. The third of the three Shining Ones who saluted Christian at the +cross set a mark on his forehead, and put a roll with a seal set upon it +into his hand. A roll and a seal which he bid him look on as he ran, and +that he should give that roll in at the Celestial Gate. Bunyan does not +in all places come up to his usual clearness in what he says about the +sealed roll. We must believe that he understood his own meaning and +intention in all that he says, first and last, about the roll, but he has +not always made his meaning clear, at least to one of his readers. +Theological students, and, indeed, all thoughtful Christian men, are +invited to read Dr. Cunningham's powerful paper on Assurance in his +_Reformers_. The whole literature of Assurance is there taken up and +weighed and sifted with all that great writer's incomparable learning and +power and judgment. Our Larger Catechism, also, is excellent on this +subject; and this subject is a favourite commonplace with all our best +Calvinistic, Puritan, and Evangelical authors. Let us take two or three +passages out of those authors just as a specimen, and so close. + +"Can true believers"--Larger Catechism, Question 80--"Can true believers +be infallibly assured that they are in an estate of grace, and that they +shall persevere therein to the end? _Answer_: Such as truly believe in +Christ, and endeavour to walk in all good conscience before Him may, +without extraordinary revelation, by faith grounded upon the truth of +God's promise, and by the Spirit enabling them to discern in themselves +those graces to which the promises of eternal life are made, and bearing +witness with their spirits that they are the children of God, they may be +infallibly assured that they are in the estate of grace, and shall +persevere therein unto salvation." Question 81: "Are all true believers +at all times assured of their present being in a state of grace, and that +they shall be saved? _Answer_: Assurance of grace and salvation not +being of the essence of faith, true believers may wait long before they +obtain it, and, after the enjoyment thereof, may have it weakened and +intermitted through manifold distempers, sins, temptations, and +desertions; yet are they never left without such a presence and support +of the Spirit of God as keeps them from sinking into utter despair." "A +Christian's assurance," says Fraser of Brea, "though it does not firstly +flow from his holiness, yet is ever after proportionable to his holy +walking. Faith is kept in a pure conscience. Sin is like a blot of ink +fallen upon our evidence. This I found to be a truth." "It was the +speech of one to me," says Thomas Shepard of New England, "next to the +donation of Christ, no mercy like this, to deny assurance long; and why? +For if the Lord had not, I should have given way to a loose heart and +life. And this is a rule I have long held--long denial of assurance is +like fire to burn out some sin and then the Lord will speak peace." +"Serve your God day and night faithfully," says Dr. Goodwin. "Walk +humbly; and there is a promise of the Holy Ghost to come and fill your +hearts with joy unspeakable and glorious to rear you up to the day of +redemption. Sue this promise out, wait for it, rest not in believing +only, rest not in assurance by graces only; there is a further assurance +to be had." "I would not give a straw for that assurance," says John +Newton, "which sin will not damp. If David had come from his adultery +and still have talked of his assurance, I should have despised his +speech." "When we want the faith of assurance," says Matthew Henry, "let +us live by the faith of adherence." And then the whole truth is in a +nutshell in Isaiah and in John: "The effect of righteousness shall be +quietness and assurance for ever," and "My little children, let us not +love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth. And hereby we +shall know that we are of the truth, and so shall assure our hearts +before Him." + + + + +CHRISTIANA + + + "Honour widows that are widows indeed."--_Paul_. + +We know next to nothing of Christiana till after she is a widow indeed. +The names of her parents, and what kind of parents they were, the schools +and the boarding-schools to which they sent their daughter, her school +companions, the books she read, if she ever read any books at all, the +amusements she was indulged in and indulged herself in--on all that her +otherwise full and minute biographer is wholly silent. He does not go +back beyond her married life; he does not even go back to the beginning +of that. The only thing we are sure of about Christiana's early days is +that she was an utterly ungodly woman and that she married an utterly +ungodly man. "Have you a family? Are you a married man?" asked Charity +of Christian in the House Beautiful. "I have a wife and four small +children," he replied. "And why did you not bring them along with you?" +Then Christian wept, and said: "Oh, how willingly would I have done it; +but they were all utterly averse to my going on pilgrimage." "But you +should have talked to them," said Charity, "and have endeavoured to have +shown them the danger of being behind." "So I did," answered Christian. +"And did you pray to God that He would bless your counsel to them?" "Yes, +and with much affection; for you must think that my wife and poor +children were very dear unto me." "But what could they say for +themselves why they came not?" "Why, my wife was afraid of losing the +world, and my children were given over to the foolish delights of youth; +so what with one thing and what with another, they left me to wander in +this manner alone." + +But what her husband's conversion, good example, and most earnest +entreaties could not all do for his worldly wife, that his sudden death +speedily did. And thus it is that both Christiana's best life, all our +interest in her, and all our information about her, dates, sad to say, +not from her espousal, nor from her marriage day, nor from any part of +her married life, but from her husband's death. Her maidenhood has no +interest for us; all our interest is fixed on her widowhood. This work +of fiction now in our hands begins where all other works of fiction end; +for in the life of religion, you must know, our best is always before us. +Well, scarcely was her husband dead when Christiana began to accuse +herself of having killed him. To take her own bitter words for it, the +most agonising and remorseful thoughts about her conduct to her husband +stung her heart like so many wasps. Ah yes! A wasp's sting is but a +blade of innocent grass compared with the thoughts that have stung us all +as we recalled what we said and did to those who are now no more. There +are graves in the churchyard we dare not go near. "I have sinned away +your father!" she cried, as she threw herself on the earth at the feet of +her astounded children. "I have sinned away your father and he is gone!" +And yet there was no mark of a bullet and no gash of a knife on his dead +body, and no chemistry could have extracted one grain of arsenic or of +strychnine out of his blood. But there are many ways of taking a man's +life besides those of poison or a knife or a gunshot. Constant fault- +finding, constant correction and studied contempt before strangers, total +want of sympathy and encouragement, gloomy looks, rough remarks, all +blame and never a word of praise, things like these between man and wife +will kill as silently and as surely as poison or suffocation. Look at +home, my brethren, and ask yourselves what you will think of much of your +present conduct when it has borne its proper fruit. "Upon this came into +her mind by swarms all her unkind, unnatural, and ungodly carriages to +her dear friend, which also clogged her conscience and did load her with +guilt. It all returned upon her like a flash of lightning, and rent the +caul of her heart asunder." "That which troubleth me most," she would +cry out, "is my churlish carriages to him when he was under distress. I +am that woman," she would cry out and would not be appeased--"I am that +woman that was so hardhearted as to slight my husband's troubles, and +that left him to go on his journey alone. How like a churl I carried +myself to him in all that! And so guilt took hold of my mind," she said +to the Interpreter, "and would have drawn me to the pond!" + +A minister's widow once told me that she had gone home after hearing a +sermon of mine on the text, "What profit is there in my blood?" and had +destroyed a paper of poison she had purchased in her despair on the +previous Saturday night. It was not a sermon from her unconscious +minister, but it was far better; it was a conversation that Christiana +held with her four boys that fairly and for ever put all thought of the +pond out of their mother's remorseful mind. "So Christiana," as we read +in the opening of her history--"so Christiana called her sons together +and began thus to address herself unto them: My sons, I have, as you may +perceive, been of late under much exercise in my soul about the death of +your father. My carriages to your father in his distress are a great +load on my conscience. Come, my children, let us pack up and be gone to +the gate, that we may see your father and be with him, according to the +laws of that land." I like that passage, I think, the best in all +Christiana's delightful history--that passage which begins with these +words: "So she called her children together." For when she called her +children together she opened to them both her heart and her conscience; +and from that day there was but one heart and one conscience in all that +happy house. I was walking alone on a country road the other day, and as +I was walking I was thinking about my pastoral work and about my people +and their children, when all at once I met one of my people. My second +sentence to him was: "This very moment I was thinking about your sons. +How are they getting on?" He quite well understood me. He knew that I +was not indifferent as to how they were getting on in business, but he +knew that I was alluding more to the life of godliness and virtue in +their hearts and in their characters. "O sir," he said, "you may give +your sons the skin off your back, but they will not give you their +confidence!" So had it been with Christian and his sons. He had never +managed, even in his religion, to get into the confidence of his sons; +but when their mother took them into her agonised confidence, from that +day she was in all their confidences, good and bad. You who are in your +children's confidences will pray in secret for my lonely friend with the +skin off his back, will you not? that he may soon be able to call his +sons together so as to start together on a new life of family love, and +family trust, and family religion. That was a fine sight. Who will make +a picture of it? This widow indeed at the head of her family council- +table, and Matthew at the foot, and James and Joseph and Samuel all in +their places. "Come, my children, let us pack up that we may see your +father!" Then did her children burst into tears for joy that the heart +of their mother was so inclined. + +From that first family council let us pass on to Christiana's last +interview with her family and her other friends. Her biographer +introduces her triumphant translation with this happy comment on the +margin: "How welcome is death to them that have nothing to do but die!" +Well, that was exactly Christiana's case. She had so packed up at the +beginning of her journey; she had so got and had so kept the confidences +of all her sons; she had seen them all so married in the Lord, and thus +so settled in a life of godliness and virtue; she had, in short, lived +the life of a widow indeed, till, when the post came for her, she had +nothing left to do but just to rise up and follow him. His token to her +was an arrow with a point sharpened with love, let easily into her heart, +which by degrees wrought so effectually with her that at the time +appointed she must be gone. We have read of arrows of death sharpened +sometimes with steel and sometimes with poison; but this arrow, shot from +heaven, was sharpened to a point with love. Indeed, that arrow, or the +very fellow of it, had been shot into Christiana's heart long ago when +she stood at that spot somewhat ascending where was a cross and a +sepulchre; and, especially, ever since the close of Greatheart's great +discourse on pardon by deed. For the hearing of that famous discourse +had made her exclaim: "Oh! Thou loving One, it makes my heart bleed to +think that Thou shouldest bleed for me! Oh! Thou blessed One, Thou +deservest to have me, for Thou hast bought me! Thou deservest to have me +all, for Thou hast paid for me ten thousand times more than I am worth!" +Now it was with all that love working effectually in her heart that +Christiana called for her children to give them her blessing. And what a +comfort it was to her to see them all around her with the mark of the +kingdom on their foreheads, and with their garments white. "My sons and +my daughters," she said, "be you all ready against the time His post +calls for you." Then she called for Mr. Valiant-for-truth, and entreated +him to have an eye on her children, and to speak comfortably to them if +at any time he saw them faint. And then she gave Mr. Standfast her ring. +"Behold," she said, as Mr. Honest came in--"Behold an Israelite indeed, +in whom is no guile!" Then Mr. Ready-to-halt came in, and then Mr. +Despondency and his daughter Much-afraid, and then Mr. Feeble-mind. Now +the day drew on that Christiana must be gone. So the road was full of +people to see her take her journey. But, behold! all the banks beyond +the river were full of horses and chariots which were come down from +above to accompany her to the City gates, so she came forth and entered +the river with a beckon of farewell to those that followed her to the +river-side. The last word she was heard to say here was, "I come, Lord, +to be with Thee, and to bless Thee." + +But with all this, you must not suppose that this good woman, this mother +in Israel, had forgotten her grandchildren. She would sooner have +forgotten her own children. But she was too good a woman to forget +either. For long ago, away back at the river on this side the Delectable +Mountains, she had said to her four daughters--I must tell you exactly +what she has said: "Here," she said, "in this meadow there are cotes and +folds for sheep, and an house is built here also for the nourishing and +bringing up of those lambs, even the babes of those women that go on +pilgrimage. Also there is One here who can have compassion and that can +gather these lambs with His arm and carry them in His bosom. This Man, +she said, will house and harbour and succour the little ones, so that +none of them shall be lacking in time to come. This Man, if any of them +go astray or be lost, He will bring them again, He will bind up that +which was broken, and will strengthen them that are sick. So they were +content to commit their little ones to that Man, and all this was to be +at the charge of the King, and so it was as a hospital to young children +and orphans." + +And now I shall sum up my chief impressions of Christiana under the three +heads of her mind, her heart, and her widowhood indeed. + +1. The mother of Christian's four sons was a woman of real mind, as so +many of the maidens, and wives, and widows of Puritan England and +Covenanting Scotland were. You gradually gather that impression just +from being beside her as the journey goes on. She does not speak much; +but, then, there is always something individual, remarkable, and +memorable in what she says. I have a notion of my own that Christiana +must have been a reader of that princely Puritan, John Milton. And if +that was so, that of itself would be certificate enough as to her +possession of mind. There is always a dignity and a strength about her +utterances that make us feel sure that she had always had a mind far +above her neighbours, Mrs. Bat's-eyes, Mrs. Light-mind, and Mrs. Know- +nothing. The first time she opens her mouth in our hearing she lets fall +an expression that Milton had just made famous in his _Samson_-- + + "Ease to the body some, none to the mind + From restless thoughts, that like a deadly swarm + Of hornets armed no sooner found alone, + But rush upon me thronging, and present + Times past, what once I was, and what am now." + +Nor can I leave this point without asserting it to you that no church and +no school of theology has ever developed the mind as well as sanctified +the heart of the common people like the preaching of the Puritan pulpit. +Matthew Arnold was not likely to over-estimate the good that Puritanism +had done to England. Indeed, in his earlier writings he sometimes went +out of his way to lament the hurt that the Puritan spirit had done to +liberality of life and mind in his native land. But in his riper years +we find him saying: "Certainly," he says, "I am not blind to the faults +of the Puritan discipline, but it has been an invaluable discipline for +that poor, inattentive, and immoral creature, man. And the more I read +history and the more I see of mankind, the more I recognise the value of +the Puritan discipline." And in that same Address he "founded his best +hopes for that so enviable and unbounded country in which he was +speaking, America, on the fact that so many of its millions had passed +through the Puritan discipline." John Milton was a product of that +discipline on the one hand, as John Bunyan was on the other. Christiana +was another of its products in the sphere of the family, just as Matthew +Arnold himself had some of his best qualities out of the same fruitful +school. + +2. Her heart, her deep, strong, tender heart, is present on every page +of Christiana's noble history. Her heart keeps her often silent when the +water in her eyes becomes all the more eloquent. When she does let her +heart utter itself in words, her words are fine and memorable. As, for +one instance, after Greatheart's discourse on redemption. "O Mercy, that +thy father and mother were here; yea, and Mrs. Timorous also. Nay, I +wish with all my heart now that here was Madam Wanton, too. Surely, +surely, their hearts would be affected, nor could the fear of the one, +nor the powerful lusts of the other, prevail with them to go home again, +and to refuse to become good pilgrims." But it was not so much what she +said herself that brought out the depth and tenderness of Christiana's +heart, it was rather the way her heart loosened other people's tongues. +You must all have felt how some people's presence straitens your heart +and sews up your mouth. While there are other people, again, whose +simple presence unseals your heart and makes you eloquent. We ministers +keenly feel that both in our public and in our private ministrations. +There are people in whose hard and chilling presence we cannot even say +grace as we should say it. Whereas, we all know other people, people of +a heart, that is, whose presence somehow so touches our lips that we +always when near them rise far above ourselves. Christiana did not speak +much to her guides and instructors and companions, but they always spoke +their best to her, and it was her heart that did it. + +3. And then a widow indeed is just a true and genuine widow; a widow not +in her name and in her weeds only, but still more in her deep heart, in +her whole life, and in her garnered experience. "Honour widows that are +widows indeed. Now, she that is a widow indeed and desolate, trusteth in +God, and continueth in supplications and in prayers night and day. Well +reported of for good works; if she have brought up children, if she have +lodged strangers, if she have washed the saints' feet, if she have +relieved the afflicted, if she have diligently followed every good work." +These are the true marks and seals and occupations of a widow indeed. And +if she has had unparalleled trials and irreparable losses, she has her +corresponding consolations and compensations. For she has a freedom to +go about and do good, a liberty and an experience that neither the +unmarried maiden nor the married wife can possibly have. She can do +multitudes of things that in the nature of things neither of them can +attempt to do. Things that would be both unseemly and impossible for +other women to say or to do are both perfectly seemly and wholly open for +her to say and to do. Her widowhood is a sacred shield to her. Her +sorrow is a crown of honour and a sceptre of authority to her. She is +consulted by the young and the inexperienced, by the forsaken and by the +forlorn, as no other human being ever is. She has come through this +life, and by a long experience she knows this world and the hearts that +fill it and make it what it is. A widow indeed can show a sympathy, and +give a counsel, and speak with a weight of wisdom that one's own mother +cannot always do. All you who by God's sad dispensation are now clothed +in the "white and wimpled folds" of widowhood, let your prayer and your +endeavour day and night be that God would guide and enable you to be +widows indeed. And, if you do, you shall want neither your occupation +nor your honour. + + + + +THE ENCHANTED GROUND + + + "Surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any + divination against Israel."--_Balaam_. + +"I saw then in my dream that they went till they came into a certain +country whose air naturally tended to make one drowsy if he came a +stranger to it. And here Hopeful began to be very dull and heavy of +sleep, wherefore he said unto Christian, I do now begin to grow so drowsy +that I can scarcely hold up mine eyes; let us lie down here and take one +nap." And then when we turn to the same place in the Second Part we read +thus: "By this time they were got to the Enchanted Ground, where the air +naturally tended to make one drowsy. And that place was all grown over +with briars and thorns, excepting here and there, where was an enchanted +arbour, upon which, if a man sits, or in which if a man sleeps, 'tis a +question, say some, whether they shall ever rise or wake again in this +world. Now, they had not gone far, but a great mist and darkness fell +upon them all, so that they could scarce, for a great while, see the one +the other. Wherefore they were forced for some time to feel for one +another by words, for they walked not by sight. Nor was there on all +this ground so much as one inn or victualling-house wherein to refresh +the feebler sort. Then they came to an arbour, warm, and promising much +refreshing to the pilgrims, for it was finely wrought above head, +beautified with greens, and furnished with couches and settles. It also +had a soft couch on which the weary might lean. This arbour was called +The Slothful Man's Friend, on purpose to allure, if it might be, some of +the pilgrims there to take up their rest when weary. This, you must +think, all things considered, was tempting. I saw in my dream also that +they went on in this their solitary way till they came to a place at +which a man is very apt to lose his way. Now, though when it was light, +their guide could well enough tell how to miss those ways that led wrong, +yet in the dark he was put to a stand. But he had in his pocket a map of +all ways leading to or from the Celestial City, wherefore he struck a +light (for he never goes also without his tinder-box), and takes a view +of his book or map, which bids him be careful in that place to turn to +the right-hand way. Then I thought with myself, who that goeth on +pilgrimage but would have one of those maps about him, that he may look +when he is at a stand, which is the way to take?" + +1. "But what is the meaning of all this?" asked Christiana of the guide. +"This Enchanted Ground,"--her able and experienced friend answered her, +"this is one of the last refuges that the enemy to pilgrims has; +wherefore it is, as you see, placed almost at the end of the way, and so +it standeth against us with the more advantage. For when, thinks the +enemy, will these fools be so desirous to sit down as when they are +weary, and when so like to be weary as when almost at their journey's +end? Therefore it is, I say, that the Enchanted Ground is placed so nigh +to the land Beulah and so near the end of their race; wherefore let +pilgrims look to themselves lest they fall asleep till none can waken +them." "That masterpiece of Bunyan's insight into life, the Enchanted +Ground," says Mr. Louis Stevenson, "where his allegory cuts so deep to +people looking seriously on life." Yes, indeed, Bunyan's insight into +life! And his allegory that cuts so deep! For a neophyte, and one with +little insight into life, or into himself, would go to look for this land +of darkness and thorns and pitfalls, alternated with arbours and settles +and soft couches--one new to life and to himself, I say, would naturally +expect to see all that confined to the region between the City of +Destruction and the Slough of Despond; or, at the worst, long before, and +never after, the House Beautiful. But Bunyan looked too straight at life +and too unflinchingly into his own heart to lay down his sub-Celestial +lands in that way; and when we begin to look with a like seriousness on +the religious life, and especially when we begin to look bold enough and +deep enough into our own heart, then we too shall freely acknowledge the +splendid master-stroke of Bunyan in the Enchanted Ground. That this so +terrible experience is laid down almost at the end of the Celestial +way--the blaze of light that pours upon our heads fairly startles us, +while at the same time it comforts us and assures us. That this +Enchanted Ground, which has proved so fatal to so many false pilgrims, +and so all but fatal to so many true pilgrims, should lie around the very +borders of Beulah, and should be within all but eye-shot of the Celestial +City itself,--that is something to be thankful for, and something to lay +up in the deepest and the most secret place in our heart. That these +pilgrims, after all their feastings and entertainments--after the +Delectable Mountains and the House Beautiful--should all be plunged upon +a land where there was not so much as a roadside inn, where the ways were +so dark and so long that the pilgrims had to shout aloud in order to keep +together, where, instead of moon or stars, they had to walk in the spark +of a small tinder-box--what an encouragement and assurance to us is all +that! That is no strange thing, then, that is now happening to us, when, +after our fine communion season, we have suddenly fallen back into this +deep darkness, and are cast into these terrible temptations, and feel as +if all our past experiences and attainments and enjoyments had been but a +self-delusion and a snare. That we should all but have fallen fast +asleep, and all but have ceased both from watching against sin and from +waiting upon God--well, that is nothing more than Hopeful himself would +have done had he not had a wary old companion to watch over him, and to +hold his eyes open. Let all God's people present who feel that they are +nothing better of all they have enjoyed of Scriptures and sacraments, but +rather worse; let all those who feel sure that they have wandered into a +castaway land, so dark, so thorny, so miry, and so lonely is their +life--let them read this masterpiece of John Bunyan again and again and +take heart of hope. + + "When Saints do sleepy grow, let them come hither + And hear how these two pilgrims talk together; + Yea, let them hear of them, in any wise, + Thus to keep ope their drowsy slumb'ring eyes; + Saints' fellowship, if it be managed well, + Keeps them awake, and that in spite of hell." + +2. But far worse than all its briars and thorns, far more fatal than all +its ditches and pitfalls, were the enchanted arbours they came on here +and there planted up and down that evil land. For those arbours are all +of this fatal nature, that if a man falls asleep in any of them it arises +a question whether he shall ever come to himself again in this world. +Now, where there are no inns nor victualling-houses, no Gaius and no Mr. +Mnason, what a danger all those ill-intended arbours scattered all up and +down that country become! Well, then, the first enchanted arbour that +the pilgrims came to was built just inside the borders of the land, and +it was called The Stranger's Arbour--so many new-comers had lain down in +it never to rise again. The young and the inexperienced, with those who +were naturally of a believing, buoyant, easy mind, lay down in hundreds +here. Hopeful's mind was naturally a mind of a soft and easy and self- +indulgent cast; and had he been alone that day, or had he had for a +companion a man of a less wary, less anxious, and less urgent mind than +Christian was, Hopeful had taken a nap, as he so confidingly called it--a +fatal nap in that arbour built by the enemy of pilgrims, just on purpose +for the young and the ignorant, the inexperienced and the self-indulgent. + +3. The Slothful Man's Arbour has been already described. It was a warm +arbour, and it promised much refreshing to the pilgrims. It also had in +it a soft couch on which the weary might lean. "Let us lie down here and +take just one nap; we shall be refreshed if we take a nap!" "Do you not +remember," said the other, "that one of the shepherds bid us beware of +the Enchanted Ground? And he meant by that that we should beware of +sleeping; wherefore let us not sleep as do others, but let us watch and +be sober." Now, what is a nap? And what is it to take a nap in our +religion? The New Testament is full of warnings to those who read it and +go by it--most solemn and most fearful warnings--against _sleep_. Now, +have you any clear idea in your minds as to what this divinely denounced +sleep is? Sleep is good and necessary in our bodily life. We would not +live long if we did not sleep; we would soon go out of our mind; we would +soon lose our senses if we did not sleep. Insomnia is one of the worst +symptoms of our eager, restless, over-worked age. "He giveth His beloved +sleep"; and while they sleep their corn grows they know not how. But +sleep in the great exhortation-passages of the Holy Scriptures does not +mean rest and restoration; it means in all those passages insensibility, +stupidity, danger, and death. In our nightly sleep, and in the measure +of its soundness, we are utterly dead to the world around us. Men may +come into our house and rob us of our most precious possessions; they may +even come up to our bed and murder us; our whole house may be in a blaze +about us; we may only awaken to leap out of sleep into eternity. Now, we +are all in a sleep like that in our souls. There is above us, and around +us, and beneath us, and within us the eternal world, and we are all sound +asleep; we are all stone-dead in the midst of it. Devils and wicked men +are stealing our treasures for eternity, and we are sound asleep; hell is +already kindling our bed beneath us, but we smell not its flames, or we +only catch the first gasp of them before we make our everlasting bed +among them. Therefore let us not sleep as do others, but let us watch +and be sober. What meanest thou, O sleeper? arise and call upon thy God! +When the guide shook Heedless and Too-bold off their settles in that +slothful arbour, the one of them said with his eyes still shut, "I will +pay you when I take my money," and the other said, "I will fight so long +as I can hold my sword in my hand." At that one of the children laughed. +"What is the meaning of that?" asked Christiana. The guide said: "They +talk in their sleep." So they did, and so do all men. For this whole +world is full of settles on which men sleep and talk in their sleep. The +newspapers to-morrow morning will all be full to overflowing of what men +have said and written to-day and yesterday in their sleep. The shops and +the banks and the exchanges will all be full of men making promises and +settling accounts in their sleep. They will finger their purses, and +grasp their swords, and all in their sleep. And not children but devils +will laugh as they hear the folly that falls from men's lips who are +besotted with spiritual sleep and drugged with spiritual and fleshly sin. +A dream cometh through the multitude of business. I had just got this +length in this lecture the other night when I went to sleep. And in my +sleep one of my people came to me and asked me if I could make it quite +clear and plain to him what it would be for a man like him after a +communion-time to begin to walk with God. And I just wish I could make +the things of the Enchanted Ground as plain to myself and to you to-night +as I was able to make a walk with God plain to myself and to my visitor +that night in my ministerial dream. I often wish that my business mind +worked as well in my study chair and in my pulpit as it sometimes does in +my bed and in my sleep. "Now, I beheld in my dream that they talked more +in their sleep at this time than ever they did in all their journey. And +being in a muse thereabout, the gardener said even to me: Wherefore +musest thou at the matter? It is the nature of the fruit of the grapes +of those vineyards to go down so sweetly as to cause the lips of them +that are asleep to speak." The reason my poor lips spake so sweetly +about a walk with God that night most have been because I spent all the +summer evening before walking with God and with you in the vineyards of +Beulah. + +4. Listen to Samson, shorn of his locks, as he shakes himself off a soft +and sweetly-worked couch in The Sensual Man's Arbour: + + "No, no; + It fits not; thou and I long since are twain; + Nor think me so unwary or accurst + To bring my feet again into the snare + Where once I have been caught; I know thy trains, + Though dearly to my cost, thy gins, and toils; + Thy fair enchanted cup and warbling charms + No more on me have power, their force is null'd; + So much of adder's wisdom have I learnt + To fence my ear against thy sorceries. + If in my flower of youth and strength, when all men + Loved, honour'd, fear'd me, thou alone couldst hate me, + Thy husband, slight me, sell me, and forego me; + How wouldst thou use me now, blind, and thereby + Deceivable, in most things as a child, + Helpless, thence easily contemn'd, and scorn'd, + And last neglected? How wouldst thou insult, + When I must live uxorious to thy will + In perfect thraldom! How again betray me, + Bearing my words and doings to the lords + To gloss upon, and censuring, frown or smile! + This jail I count the house of liberty + To thine, whose doors my feet shall never enter." + +5. The love of money to some men is the root of all evil. There came +once a youth to St. Philip Neri and, flushed with joy, told him that his +parents after much entreaty had at length allowed him to study law. St. +Philip was not a man of many words. "What then?" the saint simply asked +the shining youth. "Then I shall become a lawyer!" "And then?" pursued +Philip. "Then," said the young man, "I shall earn a nice sum of money, +and I shall purchase a fine country house, procure a carriage and horses, +marry a handsome and rich wife, and lead a delightful life!" "And then?" +"Then,"--the youth reflected as death and eternity arose before his eyes, +and from that day he began to take care of his immortal soul. Philip +with one word snatched that young man's soul off The Rich Man's Settle. + +6. The Vain Man's Settle draws down many men to shame and everlasting +contempt. Praise a vain man or a vain woman aright and enough and you +will get them to do anything you like. Give a vain man sufficient +publicity in your paper or on your platform and he will become a spy, a +traitor, and cut-throat in your service. The sorcerer's cup of +praise--keep it full enough in a vain man's hand, and he will sleep in +the arbour of vanity till he wakens in hell. Madam Bubble, the +arch-enchantress, knows her own, and she has, with her purse, her +promotion, and her praise, bought off many a promising pilgrim. + +7. And then she, by virtue of whose sorceries this whole land is drugged +and enchanted, is such a bold slut that she will build a Sacred Arbour +even, and will fill it full of religious enchantment for you rather than +lose hold of you. She will consecrate places and persons and periods for +you if your taste lies that way; she will build costly and stately +churches for you; she will weave rich vestments and carve rich vessels; +she will employ all the arts; she will even sanctify and set apart and +seat aloft her holy men--what will she not do to please you, to take you, +to intoxicate and enchant you? She will juggle for your soul equally +well whether you are a country clown in a feeing-market or a fine lady of +aesthetic tastes and religious sensibilities in the capital and the +court. But I shall let Father Faber speak, who can speak on this subject +both with authority and with attraction. "She can open churches, and +light candles on the altar, and intone _Te Deums_ to the Majesty on high. +She can pass into the beauty of art, into the splendour of dress, and +into the magnificence of furniture. She can sit with high principles on +her lips discussing a religious vocation and praising God and sanctity. +On the benches of bishops and in the pages of good books you will find +her, and yet she is all the while the same huge evil creature." Yes; she +is all the time the same Madam Bubble who offered to Standfast her body, +her purse, and her bed. + +Now, would you know for yourself, like the communicant who came to me in +my sleep, how you are ever to get past all those arbours, and settles, +and seats, and couches, with all their sweet sorceries and intoxicating +enchantments--would you in earnest know that? Then study well the case +of one Standfast. Especially the time when she who enchants this whole +ground hereabouts set so upon that pilgrim. In one word, it was this: he +remembered his Lord; and, like his Lord, he fell on his face; and as his +Lord would have it, His servant's lips as they touched the ground touched +also the healing plant harmony and he was saved. + + "A small unsightly root, + But of divine effect. + Unknown, and like esteem'd, and the dull swain + Treads on it daily with his clouted shoon; + And yet more med'cinal is it than that moly + That Hermes once to wise Ulysses gave; + He call'd it haemony, and gave it me, + And bade me keep it as of sovran use + 'Gainst all enchantments, mildew, blast, or damp, + Or ghastly furies' apparition. + And now I find it true; for by this means + I knew the foul enchantress, though disguised, + Enter'd the very lime-twigs of her spells, + And yet came off. If you have this about you + (As I will give you when you go) you may + Boldly assault the necromancer's hall: + Where if she be, with dauntless hardihood, + And brandished blade, rush on her, break her glass, + And shed her luscious liquor on the ground, + And seize her wand." + +Prayer, my sin-beset brethren, standfast prayer, is the otherwise +unidentified haemony whose best habitat was the Garden of Gethsemane; and +with that holy root in your heart and in your mouth, there is "no +enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination against +Israel." + + + + +THE LAND OF BEULAH + + + "Thou shalt be called Hephzibah, and thy land Beulah."--_Isaiah_. + +The first thing that John Bunyan tells us about the land of Beulah is +this--that the shortest and the best way to the Celestial City lies +directly through that land. The land of Beulah has its own indigenous +inhabitants indeed. Old men dwell in the streets of Beulah, and every +man with his staff in his hand for very age. The streets of the city +also are full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof. The land +of Beulah has its frequent visitors also, and its welcome guests from the +regions above. Some of the shining ones come down from time to time and +make a short sojourn in Beulah. The angels in heaven have such a desire +to see the lands from which God's saints come up that at certain seasons +all the suburbs of the Celestial City are full of those shining servants +of God and of the Lamb. + +But what made the dreamer to smile and to talk so in his sleep was when +he saw that all the upward ways to the Celestial City ran through the +land of Beulah. He saw also in his dream how all the pilgrims blamed +themselves so bitterly now because they had misspent so much of their +time and strength in the ways below, and so had not come sooner to see +and to taste this blessed land. But, at the same time, as it was, they +all rejoiced with a great joy because that, after all their delays and +all their wanderings, their way still led them through the borders of +Beulah. Now, my dear fellow-communicants, how shall we find our way at +once, and without any more wanderings, into that so desirable land? How +shall we attain to walk its streets all the rest of our days with our +staff in our hand? How shall we hope to see our boys and our girls +playing in the streets of Beulah, and eating all their days of its sweet +and its healing fruits? How shall we and our children with us henceforth +escape the Slough of Despond, and Giant Despair's dungeon, and the Valley +of the Shadow of Death? The word, my brethren, the answer to all that, +is nigh unto us, even in our mouth and in our heart. For faith, simple +faith, will do all that both for us and for our children beside us. A +heart-feeding faith in God, in the word of God, and in the Son of God, +will do it. Faith, and then obedience. For obedience, my brethren, is +Beulah. All obedience is already Beulah. Holy obedience will bring the +whole of Beulah into your heart and into mine at any moment. It is +disobedience that makes so many of those who otherwise are true pilgrims +to miss so much of the land of Beulah. Ask any affable old man with his +staff in his hand for very age, and he will tell you that it was his +disobedience that kept him so long out of the land of Beulah. While, let +any man, and above all, let any young man, begin early to live a life of +believing obedience, and he will grow up and grow old and see his +children's children playing around his staff in the streets of Beulah. +Let any young man make the experiment for himself upon obedience and upon +Beulah. Let him not too easily believe any dreamer or even any seer +about obedience and about the land of Beulah. It is his own matter and +not theirs; and let him make experiment upon it all for his own +satisfaction and assurance. Let any young man, then, try prayer as his +first step into obedience, and especially secret prayer. Let him shut +his door to-night, and let him see if he is not already inside one of the +gates of Beulah. Let him deny himself every day also, if it is only in a +very little thing. Let him say sternly to his own heart every hour of +temptation, No! never! and on the spot a sweet waft of Beulah's finest +spices will fall upon his face. "The ineffable joy of renouncing joy" +will every day make the lonely wilderness of this world a constant Beulah +to such a man. For, to live at all times, in all places, and in all +things for other men, and never and in nothing for yourself--that is the +deepest secret of Beulah. To say it, if need be, three times to-night on +your face and in a sweat of blood, "Not my will, but Thine be done!"--that +will to-night turn the garden of Gethsemane itself into the very garden +of Glory. Do you doubt it? Are you not yet able to believe it? Then +hear about it from One who has Himself come through it. Hear His word +upon the whole matter who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. "Come +unto Me," says the King of Beulah, "all ye that labour and are heavy +laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me, +for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. +For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." So after He had washed +their feet, and had taken His garments and was set down again, He said +unto them, "Know ye what I have done to you? For I have given you an +example, that ye should do as I have done to you. If ye know these +things, happy are ye if ye do them. If ye love Me, keep My commandments. +And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that +He may abide with you for ever. If a man love Me, he will keep My words; +and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him and will make Our +abode with him. Peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you: not as +the world giveth, give I unto you. These things have I spoken unto you +that My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full. +Hitherto ye have asked nothing in My name; ask, and ye shall receive, +that your joy may be full. Father, I will that they also, whom Thou hast +given Me, be with Me where I am." And thus I saw in my dream that their +way lay right through the land of Beulah, in which land they solaced +themselves for a season. + +2. "They solaced themselves." Now, solace is just the Latin _solatium_, +which, again, is just a soothing, an assuaging, a compensation, an +indemnification. Well, that land into which the pilgrims had now come +was very soothing to their ruffled spirits and to their weary hearts. It +assuaged their many and sore griefs also. It more than compensated them +for all their labours and all their afflictions. And it was a full +indemnification to them for all that they had forsaken and lost both in +beginning to be pilgrims and in enduring to the end. The children of +Israel had their first solace in their pilgrimage at Elim, where there +were twelve wells of water and threescore and ten palm-trees; and they +encamped there by the waters. And then they had their last and crowning +solace when the spies came back from Eshcol with a cluster of grapes that +they bare between two upon a staff, with pomegranates and figs. And +Moses kept solacing his charge all the way through the weary wilderness +with such strong consolations as these: "For the Lord thy God bringeth +thee into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths +that spring out of valleys and hills; a land of wheat, and barley, and +vines, and fig-trees; a land of oil-olive and honey; a land wherein thou +shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt not lack anything in it; a +land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig +brass." Our Lord spake solace to His doubting and fainting disciples +also in many such words as these: "Verily, I say unto you, there is no +man that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children +for the kingdom of God's sake, who shall not receive manifold more in +this present time, and in the world to come life everlasting." The Mount +of Transfiguration also was His own Beulah-solace; and the Last Supper +and the prayer with which it wound up were given to our Lord and to His +disciples as a very Eshcol-cluster from the Paradise above. Now, I saw +in my dream that they solaced themselves in the land of Beulah for a +season. Yea, here they heard continually the singing of birds. (The +Latin poets called the birds _solatia ruris_, because they refreshed and +cheered the rustic labourers with their sweet singing.) And every day +the flowers appeared in the earth, and the voice of the turtle was heard +in the land. In this country the sun shineth night and day, for there is +no night there. + +3. "In this country the sun shineth night and day." How much Standfast +must have enjoyed that land of light you may guess when you recollect +that he came from Darkland, which lies in the hemisphere right opposite +to the land of Beulah. In Darkland the sun never shines to be called +sunshine at all. All the days of his youth, Standfast told his +companions, he had sat beside his father and his mother in that obscure +land where to his sorrow his father and his mother still sat. But in +Beulah "the rose of evening becomes silently and suddenly the rose of +dawn." This land lies beyond the Valley of the Shadow of Death, neither +could they from this place so much as see Doubting Castle. Now, Doubting +Castle is a dismal place for any soul of man to be shut up into. And in +that dark hold there are dungeons dug for all kinds of doubting souls. +There are dungeons dug for the souls of men whose doubts are in their +intellects, as well as for those also whose doubts arise out of their +hearts. Some men read themselves into Doubting Castle, and some men sin +and sell themselves to its giant. God casts some of His own children all +their days into those dungeons as a punishment for their life of +disobedience; He casts others down into chains of darkness because of +their idleness and unfruitfulness. But Beulah is far away from Doubting +Castle. Beulah is a splendid spot for a studious man to lodge in. For +what a clear light shines night and day in Beulah! To what far horizons +a man's eye will carry him in Beulah! What large speculations rise +before him who walks abroad in Beulah! How clear the air is in Beulah, +how clean the heart and how unclouded the eye of its inhabitants! The +King's walks are in Beulah, and the arbours where He delighteth to be. +Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall be admitted to see God in +the land of Beulah. In the land of Beulah the sun shall no more be thy +light by day, neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee; +but the Lord shall be thine everlasting light, and thy God thy glory! + +4. "In this land also the contract between the bride and the bridegroom +is renewed." Now, there is no other day so bitter in any man's life as +that day is on which his bridal contract is broken off. And it is the +very perfection and last extremity of bitterness when his contract is +broken off because of his own past life. Let all those, then, who would +fain enter into that sweet contract think well about it beforehand. Let +them look back into all their past life. For all their past life will be +sure to find them out on the day of their espousals. If they have their +enemies--as all espoused men have--this is the hour and the power of +their enemies. The day on which any man's espousals are published is a +small and local judgment-day to him. For all the men, and, especially, +all the women, who have ever been injured by him, or who have injured +themselves upon him; all the men and all the women who for any reason, +and for no reason, hate both him and his happiness,--their tongues and +their pens will take no sleep till they have got his contract if they +can, broken off. And even when the bridegroom is too innocent, or the +bride too true, or God too good to let the contract continue long to be +broken off, that great goodness of God and that great trust of his +contracted bride will only make the bridegroom walk henceforth more +softly and rejoice with more trembling. And that is a most excellent +mind. I know no better mind in which any man, guilty or innocent, can +enter on a married life. I sometimes tell the bridegrooms that I can +take a liberty with to keep saying to themselves all the way up to the +marriage altar the tenth verse of the 103rd psalm; as well as when they +come up afterwards to the baptismal font: "He hath not dealt with us +after our sins nor rewarded us after our iniquities." And it is surely +Beulah itself, at its very best, it is surely Beulah above itself, when a +happy bridegroom is full of that humble and happy mind, and when he is in +one and the same moment reconciled both to his bride on earth and to his +God and Father in heaven. In this land, therefore, in the land of +Beulah, the contract between the bride and the bridegroom is renewed; +yea, as the bridegroom rejoiceth over his bride, so shall thy God rejoice +over thee. + +5. The salaams and salutations also that they were met with as often as +they went out to walk in the streets thereof were a constant surprise, +satisfaction, and sweetness to the fearful pilgrims. No passer-by ever +once frowned or scowled upon them because their faces were Zionward, as +they do in our cities. No one ever treated them with scorn or contempt +because they were poor or unlettered. No man's face either turned dark +at them or was turned away from them as they passed up the street. They +never, all the time they abode in Beulah, took to the lanes of the city +to escape the unkind looks of any of its citizens. Greatheart's hand was +never away from his helmet. His helmet was never well on his head. His +always bare and unhelmeted head said to all the men of Beulah, I love and +honour and trust you. You would not hurt a hair of my head. And so on, +till all the streets of Beulah were one buzz of salutation, +congratulation, and benediction. Here they heard voices from out of the +city, loud voices, saying, Say ye to the daughter of Zion, Behold, thy +salvation cometh; behold, his reward is with him. Here all the +inhabitants of the country called them the holy people, the redeemed of +the Lord, sought out, a city not forsaken. + +6. Now, as they walked in this land they had more rejoicing than in +parts more remote from the kingdom to which they were bound. And still +drawing nigh to that city they had yet a more perfect view thereof. It +was builded of pearls and precious stones, also the street thereof was +paved with gold, so that by reason of the natural glory of the city and +the reflection of the sunbeams upon it, Christian with desire fell sick. +Hopeful also had a fit or two of the same disease. Wherefore here they +lay by it awhile, crying out because of their pangs, If you see my +beloved, tell him that I am sick of love. There are in all good cases of +recovery three successive stages of soul-sickness. True, soul-sickness +always runs its own course, and it always runs its own course in its own +order. This special sickness first shows itself when the soul becomes +sick with sin. We have that sickness set forth in many a psalm, notably +in the thirty-eighth psalm; and in a multitude of other scriptures, both +old and new, this evil disease is dealt with if we had only the eyes and +the heart to read such scriptures. The second stage of this sickness is +when a sinner is not so much sick with the sin that dwelleth in him as +sick of himself. Sinfulness in its second stage becomes so incorporate +with the sinner's whole life--sin so becomes the sinner's very nature, +and, indeed, himself,--that all his former loathing of sin passes over +henceforth into loathing of himself. This is the most desperate stage in +any man's sickness; but, bad as it is, incurable as it is, it must be +passed into before the third stage of the healing process can either be +experienced or understood. In the case in hand, by the time the pilgrims +had come to Beulah they had all had their full share of sin and of +themselves till they here entered on an altogether new experience. +"Christian with desire fell sick," we read, "and Hopeful also had a fit +or two of the same disease. Wherefore here they lay by it a while, +crying out because of their pangs, If you see my beloved, tell him that I +am sick of love." David, Paul, Bernard, Bunyan himself, Rutherford, +Brainerd, M'Cheyne, and many others crowd in upon the mind. I shall but +instance John Flavel and Mrs. Jonathan Edwards, and so close. John +Flavel being once on a journey set himself to improve the time by +meditation, when his mind grew intent, till at length he had such +ravishing tastes of heavenly joys, and such a full assurance of his +interest therein, that he utterly lost the sight and sense of this world +and all its concerns, so that for hours he knew not where he was. At +last, perceiving himself to be faint, he sat down at a spring, where he +refreshed himself, earnestly desiring, if it were the will of God, that +he might there leave the world. His spirit reviving, he finished his +journey in the same delightful frame, and all that night the joy of the +Lord still overflowed him so that he seemed an inhabitant of the other +world. The only other case of love-sickness I shall touch on to-night I +take from under the pen of a sin-sick and love-sick author, who has been +truthfully described as "one of the first, if not the very first, of the +masters of human reason," and, again, as "one of the greatest of the sons +of men." "There is a young lady in New-haven," says Edwards, "who is so +loved of that Great Being who made and rules the world, that there are +certain seasons in which this Great Being in some way or other invisible +comes to her and fills her mind with exceeding sweet delight, so that she +hardly cares for anything but to meditate upon Him. She looks soon to +dwell wholly with Him, and to be ravished with His love and delight for +ever. Therefore, if you present all this world before her, with the +richest of its treasures, she disregards it and cares not for it, and is +unmindful of any pain or affliction. She has a strange sweetness in her +mind, and a singular piety in her affections; is most just and +conscientious in all her conduct; and you could not persuade her to do +anything wrong or sinful, if you would give her the whole world. She +loves to be alone, walking in the fields and groves, and seems to have +some one invisible always communing with her." And so on, all through +her seraphic history. "Now, if such things are too enthusiastic," says +the author of _A Careful and a Strict Enquiry into the Freedom of the +Will_, "if such things are the offspring of a distempered brain, let my +brain be possessed evermore of that blessed distemper! If this be +distraction, I pray God that the whole world of mankind may all be seized +with this benign, meek, beneficent, beatific, glorious distraction! The +peace of God that passeth all understanding; rejoicing with joy +unspeakable and full of glory; God shining in our hearts, to give the +light of the knowledge of God in the face of Jesus Christ; with open face +beholding as in a glass the glory of God, and being changed into the same +image from glory to glory, even as by the spirit of the Lord; being +called out of darkness into marvellous light, and having the day-star +arise in our hearts! What a sweet distraction is that! And out of what +a heavenly distemper and out of what a sane enthusiasm has all that come +to us!" + + "More I would speak: but all my words are faint; + Celestial Love, what eloquence can paint? + No more, by mortal words, can be expressed, + But all Eternity shall tell the rest." + + + + +THE SWELLING OF JORDAN + + + "The swelling of Jordan."--_Jeremiah_. + +"Fore-fancy your deathbed," says Samuel Rutherford. "Take an essay," he +says in his greatest book, that perfect mine of gold and jewels, _Christ +Dying and Drawing Sinners to Himself_--"Take an essay and a lift at your +death, and look at it before it actually comes to your door." And so we +shall. Since it is appointed to all men once to die, and after death the +judgment; and since our death and our judgment are the only two things +that we are absolutely sure about in our whole future, we shall +henceforth fore-fancy those two events much more than we have done in the +past. And to assist us in that; to quicken our fancy, to kindle it, to +captivate it, and to turn our fancy wholly to our salvation, we have all +the entrancing river-scenes in the _Pilgrim's Progress_ set before us; a +succession of scenes in which Bunyan positively revels in his exquisite +fancies, clothing them as he does, all the time, in language of the +utmost beauty, tenderness, pathos, power, and dignity. Let us take our +stand, then, on the bank of the river and watch how pilgrim after pilgrim +behaves himself in those terrible waters. We are all voluntary +spectators to-night, but we shall all be compulsory performers before we +know where we are. + +1. On entering the river even Christian suddenly began to sink. Fore- +fancy that. All the words he spake still tended to discover that he had +great horror of mind and hearty fears that he would die in that river; +here also he was much in the troublesome thoughts of the sins he had +committed both since and before he began to be a pilgrim. Fore-fancy +that also, all you converted young men. Hopeful, therefore, had much to +do to keep his brother's head above water; yea, sometimes he would be +quite gone down, and then in a while he would rise up again half-dead. +Then I saw in my dream that Christian was in a muse a while; to whom also +Hopeful added this word, "Be of good cheer; Jesus Christ maketh thee +whole." And with that Christian broke out with a loud voice, "When thou +passest through the waters I will be with thee, and through the rivers +they shall not overflow thee." Then they both took courage and the enemy +was after that as still as a stone till they were gone over. Fore-fancy +that also. There is one other thing out of that crossing that I hope I +shall remember when I am in the river: "Be of good cheer," said Hopeful +to his sinking fellow--"Be of good cheer, my brother, I feel the bottom, +and it is good." "Hold His hand fast," wrote Samuel Rutherford to Lady +Kenmure. "He knows all the fords. You may be ducked in His company but +never drowned. Put in your foot, then, and wade after Him. And be sure +you set your feet always upon the stepping-stones." Yes; fore-fancy +those stepping-stones, and often practise your feet upon them before the +time. + +2. "Good woman," said the post to Christiana, the wife of Christian the +pilgrim; "Hail, good woman, I bring thee tidings that the Master calleth +for thee, and expecteth thee to stand in His presence in clothes of +immortality within this ten days." Fore-fancy that also. Now the day +was come that she must be gone. And so the road was full of people to +see her take her journey. But, behold, all the banks beyond the river +were full of horses and chariots which were come down from above to +accompany her to the city gate. So she came forth and entered the river +with a beckon of farewell to those that followed her to the river-side. +And thus she went and entered in at the gate with all the ceremonies of +joy that her husband had done before her. Fore-fancy, if you can, some +of those ceremonies of joy. + +3. When Mr. Fearing came to the river where was no bridge, there again +he was in a heavy case. Now, he said, he should be drowned for ever and +never see that Face with comfort he had come so many miles to behold. And +here also I took notice of what was very remarkable; the water of that +river was lower at this time than ever I saw it in all my life. So he +went over at last not much above wet-shod. Fore-fancy and fore-arrange, +if it be possible, for a passage like that. When he was going tip to the +gate Mr. Greatheart began to take his leave of him, and to wish him a +good reception above. "I shall," he said, "I shall." Be fore-assured, +also, of a reception like that. + +4. In process of time there came a post to the town again, and his +business was this time with Mr. Ready-to-halt. So he inquired him out +and said to him, "I am come to thee in the name of Him whom thou hast +loved and followed, though upon crutches. And my message is to tell thee +that He expects thee at His table to sup with Him in His kingdom the next +day after Easter." After this Mr. Ready-to-halt called for his fellow- +pilgrims and told them, saying, "I am sent for, and God shall surely +visit you also. These crutches," he said, "I bequeath to my son that he +may tread in my steps, with a hundred warm wishes that he may prove +better than I have done." When he came to the brink of the river, he +said, "Now I shall have no more need of these crutches, since yonder are +horses and chariots for me to ride on." The last words he was heard to +say were, "Welcome life!" Let all ready-to-halt hearts fore-fancy all +that. + +5. Then Mr. Feeble-mind called for his friends and told them what errand +had been brought to him, and what token he had received of the truth of +the message. "As for my feeble mind," he said, "that I shall leave +behind me, for I shall have no need of that in the place whither I go. +When I am gone, Mr. Valiant, I desire that you would bury it in a dung- +hill." This done, and the day being come in which he was to depart, he +entered the river as the rest. His last words were, "Hold out faith and +patience." Fore-fancy such an end as that to your feeble mind also. + +6. Did you ever know a family, or, rather, the relics of a family, where +there was just a decrepit old father and a lone daughter left to nurse +him through his second childhood? All his other children are either +married or dead; but both marriage and death have spared Miss Much-afraid +to watch over the dotage-days of Mr. Despondency; till one summer +afternoon the old man fell asleep in his chair to waken where old men are +for ever young. And in a day or two there were two new graves side by +side in the old churchyard. Even death could not divide this old father +and his trusty child. And so when the time was come for them to depart, +they went down together to the brink of the river. The last words of Mr. +Despondency were, "Farewell night and welcome day." His daughter went +through the river singing, but none could understand what it was she +said. Fore-fancy that, all you godly old men, with a daughter who has +made a husband and children to herself of her old father. + +7. As I hear Old Honest shouting "Grace reigns!" I always remember what +a lady told me about a saying of her poor Irish scullery-girl. The +mistress and the servant were reading George Eliot's Life together in the +kitchen, and when they came to her deathbed, on the pillow of which +Thomas A'Kempis lay open, "Mem," said the girl, "I used to read that old +book in the convent; but it is a better book to live upon than to die +upon." Now, that was exactly Old Honest's mind. He lived upon one book, +and then he died upon another. He lived according to the commandments of +God, but he died according to the comforts of the Gospel. Now, we read +in his history how that the river at that time overflowed its banks in +some places. But Mr. Honest had in his lifetime spoken to one +Good-conscience to meet him at the river, the which he also did, and lent +him his hand, and so helped him over. All the same, the last words of +Mr. Honest still were, "Grace reigns!" And so he left the world. Fore- +fancy whether or no you are making, as one has said, "an assignation with +terror" at that same river-side. + +8. Standfast was the last of the pilgrims to go over the river. +Standfast was left longest on this side the river because his Master +could best trust him here. His Master had to take away many of His other +servants from the evil to come, but He could trust Standfast. You can +safely trust a man who takes to his knees in every hour of temptation, as +Standfast was wont to do. "This river," he said, "has been a terror to +many. Yea, the thoughts of it have often frighted me also. The waters, +indeed, are to the palate bitter, and to the stomach cold; yet the +thoughts of what I am going to, and of the conduct that awaits me on the +other side, doth lie as a glowing coal at my heart. I see myself now at +the end of my journey, and my toilsome days are all ended. I am going +now to see that head that was crowned with thorns, and that face that was +spit upon for me. His name has been to me as a civet-box, yea, sweeter +than all perfumes. His word I did use to gather for my food, and for +antidotes against my faintings. He has held me up, and I have kept +myself from mine iniquities. Yea, my steps hath He strengthened in the +way." Now, while he was thus in discourse his countenance changed, his +strong man bowed down under him, and after he had said, "Take me, for I +come to Thee," he ceased to be seen of them. Fore-fancy, if you have the +face, an end like that for yourself. + +This, then, is how Christian and Hopeful and Christiana and Old Honest +and all the rest did in the swelling river. But the important point is, +HOW WILL YOU DO? Have you ever fore-fancied how you will do? Have you +ever, among all your many imaginings, imagined yourself on your deathbed? +Have you ever thought you heard the doctor whisper, "To-night"? Have you +ever lain low in your bed and listened to the death-rattle in your own +throat? And have you still listened to the awful silence in the house +after all was over? Have you ever shot in imagination the dreadful gulf +that stands fixed between life and death, and between time and eternity? +Have you ever tried to get a glimpse beforehand of your own place where +you will be an hour after your death, when they are putting the grave- +clothes on your still warm body, and when they are measuring your corpse +for your coffin? Where will you be by that time? Have you any idea? Can +you fancy it? Did you ever try? And if not, why not? "My lord," wrote +Jeremy Taylor to the Earl of Carbery, when sending him the first copy of +the _Holy Dying_,--"My lord, it is a great art to die well, and that art +is to be learnt by men in health; for he that prepares not for death +before his last sickness is like him that begins to study philosophy when +he is going to dispute publicly in the faculty. The precepts of dying +well must be part of the studies of them that live in health, because in +other notices an imperfect study may be supplied by a frequent exercise +and a renewed experience; but here, if we practise imperfectly once, we +shall never recover the error, for we die but once; and therefore it is +necessary that our skill be more exact since it cannot be mended by +another trial." How wise, then, how far-seeing, how practical, and how +urgent is the prophet's challenge and demand. "How wilt thou do in the +swelling of Jordan?" + +1. Well, then, let us be practical before we close, and let us descend +to particulars. Let us take the prophet's question and run it through +some parts and some practices of our daily life as already dying men. +And, to begin with, I have such a great faith in good books, whether we +are to live or die, that I am impelled to ask you all at this point, and +under shelter of this plain-spoken prophet, What books have you laid in +for your deathbed, and for the weeks and months and even years before +your death bed? What do you look forward to be reading when Jordan is +beginning to swell and roll for you and to leap up toward your doorstep? +If you get good from good books--everybody does not--but supposing you +are one of those who do, what books can you absolutely count upon, +without fail, to put you in the best possible frame for the river, and +for the convoy across, and for the ceremonies of joy on the other side? +What special Scriptures will you have read every day to you? "Read," +said John Knox to his weeping wife, "read where I first cast my anchor." +An old lady I once knew used to say to me at every visit, "The +Fifty-first Psalm." She was the daughter of a Highland minister, and the +wife of a Highland minister, and the mother of a Highland minister, and +of an elder to boot. "The Fifty-first Psalm," she said, and sometimes, +"One of Hart's hymns also." What is your favourite psalm and hymn? Mr. +James Taylor of Castle Street has several large-type libraries in his +catalogue. Mr. Taylor might start a much worse paying speculation than a +large-type library for the river-side; or, some select booklets for +deathbeds. The series might well open with "The Ninetieth Psalm" in +letters an inch deep. Scholars die as well as illiterates, and there +might be provided for them, among other things, _The Phaedo_ in two +languages, Plato's and Jowett's. Then _The Seven Sayings from the +Cross_. Bellarmine's _Art of Dying Well_ would stand well beside John +Bunyan's _Dying Sayings_. And, were I the editor, I would put in Bishop +Andrewes' _Private Devotions_, if only for my own last use. Then Richard +Baxter's _Saint's Rest_, and John Howe's Platonico-Puritan book, +_Blessedness of the Righteous_. Then Bernard's "New Jerusalem," "The +Sands of Time are sinking," "Rock of Ages," and such like. These are +some of the little books I have within reach of my bed against the hour +when the post blows his first horn for me. You might tell me some of +your deathbed favourites. + +2. Who will be your most welcome minister during your last days on +earth? For whom would you send to-night if the post were suddenly to +sound his horn at your side on your way home from church? I can well +believe it would not be your own minister. I have known fathers and +mothers in this congregation to send for other ministers than their own +minister when terrible trouble came upon them, and both my conscience and +my common sense absolutely approved of the step they took. Five students +were once sitting and talking together in a city in which there was to be +an execution to-morrow morning. They were talking about the murderer who +was to be executed in the morning, and about the minister he had sent for +to come to see him. And, like students, they began to put it to one +another--Suppose you were to be executed to-morrow, for what minister in +the city, or even in the whole land, would you send? And, like students +again, they said--Let each one write down on a piece of paper the name of +the minister he would choose to be beside him at the last, and we shall +see each man's last choice. They did so, when to their astonishment it +was discovered that they had all written the same minister's name! I do +not know that they all went to his church every Sabbath while they were +young and, well, and not yet under sentence of death. I do not think +they did. For when I was in his church there was only a handful of old +and decayed-looking people in it. The chief part of the congregation +seemed to me to be a charity school. And I gathered from all that a +lesson--several lessons, and this among the rest--that crowded passages +do not always wait upon the best pastors; and this also, that a waft of +death soon discovers to us a true minister from an incompetent and a +counterfeit minister. + +3. Writing to one of his correspondents about his correspondent's long- +drawn-out deathbed, Samuel Rutherford said to him, "It is long-drawn-out +that you may have ample time to go over all your old letters and all your +still unsettled accounts before you take ship." Have you any such old +letters lying still unanswered? Have you any such old accounts lying +still unsettled? Have you made full reparation and restitution for all +that you and yours have done amiss? Fore-fancy that you will soon be +summoned into His presence who has said: "herefore, if thou bring thy +gift before the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath aught +against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; +first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. +Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him." +You know all about Zacchaeus. I need not tell his story over again. But +as I write these lines I take up a London newspaper and my eyes light on +these lines: "William Avary was a man of remarkable gifts, both of mind +and character. He dedicated the residue of his strength wholly to works +of piety. In middle age he failed in business, and in his old age, when +better days came, he looked up such of his old creditors as could be +found and divided among them a sum of several thousand pounds." Look up +such of your old creditors as you can find, and that not in matters of +money alone. And, be sure you begin to do it now, before the horn blows. +For, as sure as you take your keys and open your old repositories, you +will come on things you had completely forgotten that will take more time +and more strength, ay, and more resources, than will then be at your +disposal. Even after you have begun at once and done all that you can +do, you will have to do at last as Samuel Rutherford told George +Gillespie to do: "Hand over all your bills, paid and unpaid, to your +Surety. Give Him the keys of the drawer, and let Him clear it out for +Himself after you are gone." + +4. And then, pray often to God for a clear mind between Him and you, and +for a quick, warm, and heaven-hungry heart at the last. And take a +promise from those who watch beside your bed that they will not drug and +stupefy you even though you should ask for it. Whatever your pain, and +it is all in God's hand, make up your mind, if it be possible, to bear +it. It cannot be greater than the pain of the cross, and your Saviour +would not touch their drugs, however well-intended. He determined to +face the swelling of Jordan and to enter His Father's house with an +unclouded mind. Try your very uttermost to do the same. I cannot +believe that the thief even would have let the gall so much as touch his +lips after Christ had said to him, "To-day thou shalt be with Me in +Paradise!" Well, if your mind was ever clear and keen, let it be at its +clearest and its keenest at the last. Let your mind and your heart be +full of repentance, and faith, and love, and hope, and all such saying +graces, and let them all be at their fullest and brightest exercise, at +that moment. Be on the very tip-toe of expectation as the end draws +near. Another pang, another gasp, one more unutterable sinking of heart +and flesh as if you were going down into the dreadful pit--and then the +abundant entrance, and the beatific vision! What wilt thou do then? What +wilt thou say then? Hast thou thy salutation and thy song ready? And +what will it be? + + + + +FOOTNOTES + + +{1} Delivered November 27th, 1892. + +{2} January 1st, 1893. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BUNYAN CHARACTERS (SECOND SERIES)*** + + +******* This file should be named 1886.txt or 1886.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/8/1886 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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