doubtful things, and things of less moment, eat up our zeal for the more indisputable and practical things in religion: which may give us cause to fear, that this will be the character by which our age will be known to posterity, that it was the age which talked of religion most, and loved it least." It is of the divisions among those who could as little conform with one another, as with the Church of England, that he is here speaking. And when his Mr. Badman says, "that no sin reigneth more in the world than pride among Professors," and asks "who is prouder than your Professors? scarcely the Devil himself;" Bunyan assents to this condemnation in the character of Mr. Wiseman, saying, "Who can contradict him? the thing is too apparent for any man to deny." In his last sermon he complains of the many prayerless Professors in London: "Coffeehouses," he says, "will not let you pray; trades will not let you pray; looking-glasses will not let you pray: but if you was born of God you would." In another place his censure is directed against the prayerful ones. "The Pharisee, saith the text, stood and prayed with himself. It is at this day," says Bunyan, "wonderful common for men to pray extempore also: to pray by a book, by a premeditated set form, is now out of fashion: he is counted nobody now, that cannot at any time, at a minute's warning, make a prayer of half an hour long. I am not against extempore prayer, for I believe it to be the best kind of praying; but yet I am jealous that there are a great many such prayers made, especially in pulpits and public meetings, without the breathing of the Holy Ghost in them: for if a Pharisee of old could do so, why may not a Pharisee now do the same ?—Great is the formality of religion this day, and little the power thereof! -How proud, how covetous, how like the world in garb and guise, in words and actions, are most of the great Professors of this our day! But when they come to divine worship, especially to pray, by their words and carriage there, one would almost judge them to be Angels in Heaven." Thus it appears Bunyan, like Wesley, lived to perceive "that often where there is most profession, there is least piety."

This is manifest also in another passage, which is moreover worthy of notice, because it is in Bishop Latimer's vein. It is

in his "Heavenly Footman, or Description of the Man that gets to Heaven, together with the Way he runs in, the Marks he goes by; also some Directions how to run so as to obtain." No doubt it contains the substance of some of his sermons; and to sermons in such a strain, however hearers might differ in taste and in opinions, there are none who would not listen.-"They that will have Heaven, they must run for it, because the Devil, the Law, Sin, Death, and Hell, follow them. There is never a poor Soul that is going to Heaven, but the Devil, the Law, Sin, Death, and Hell, make after that Soul. The Devil, your adversary, as a roaring Lion, goeth about, seeking whom he may devour.' And I will assure you, the Devil is nimble; he can run apace; he is light of foot; he hath overtaken many; he hath turned up their heels, and hath given them an everlasting fall. Also the Law! that can shoot a great way: have a care thou keep out of the reach of those great guns the Ten Commandments! Hell also hath a wide mouth; and can stretch itself farther than you are aware of! And as the Angel said to Lot, 'Take heed, look not behind thee, neither tarry thou in all the plain, (that is, any where between this and Heaven,) lest thou be consumed,' so say I to thee, Take heed, tarry not, lest either the Devil, Hell, Death, or the fearful curses of the Law of God, do overtake thee, and throw thee down in the midst of thy sins, so as never to rise and recover again. If this were well considered, then thou, as well as I, wouldst say, they that will have Heaven must run for it!"

"But, if thou wouldst so run as to obtain the kingdom of Heaven, then be sure that thou get into the way that leadeth thither; for it is a vain thing to think that ever thou shalt have the prize, though thou runnest never so fast, unless thou art in the way that leads to it. Set the case, that there should be a man in London that was to run to York for a wager; now though he run never so swiftly, yet if he run full south, he might run himself quickly out of breath, and be never the nearer the prize, but rather the farther off: just so is it here; it is not simply the runner, nor yet the hasty runner, that winneth the crown, unless he be in the way that leadeth thereto. I have observed, that little time that I have been a Professor, that there

is a great running to and fro, some this way, and some that way, yet it is to be fearǝd most of them are out of the way: and then, though they run as swift as the Eagle can fly, they are benefited nothing at all!-Here is one run a Quaking, another a Ranting; one again runs after the Baptism, and another after the Independency. Here's one for Free-will, and another for Presbytery; and yet possibly most of these sects run quite the wrong way; and yet every one is for his life, his soul, . . either for Heaven or Hell!-Mistrust thy own strength, and throw it away! Down on thy knees in prayer to the Lord, for the Spirit of Truth! Keep company with the soundest Christians that have most experience of Christ: and be sure thou have a care of Quakers, Ranters, Free-willers: also do not have too much company with some Anabaptists, though I go under that name myself.”

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Little has been recorded of Bunyan during the sixteen years between his enlargement and his death. It appears, that besides his yearly visit to London, he made stated circuits into other parts of England; that he exerted himself to relieve the temporal wants of those who were suffering as nonconformists under oppressive laws; that he administered diligently to the sick and afflicted, and successfully employed his influence in reconciling differences among "professors of the Gospel," and thus prevented "many disgraceful and burdensome litigations." One of his biographers thinks it highly probable that he did not escape trouble in the latter part of Charles the Second's reign, as the Justices of Bedford were so zealous in the cause of persecution;" but it is much more probable, that in a place where so much indulgence had been shewn him during the latter years of his imprisonment, he was let alone; and there can be little doubt but that if he had undergone any further vexation for the same causes, a full account of it would have been preserved. At Bedford, where he was liked as well as known, he was evidently favoured in other places he would be exposed to the same risk as other nonconforming preachers; and there is a tradition among the Baptists at Reading, that he sometimes went through that town dressed like a carter, and with a long whip in his hand, to avoid detection. Reading was a place where he was well known: the house in which the Baptists met for worship was in

a lane there, and from the back door they had a bridge over a branch of the river Kennett, whereby, in case of alarm, they might escape. In a visit to that place, he contracted the disease which brought him to the grave. A friend of his who resided there had resolved to disinherit his son; the young man requested Bunyan to interfere in his behalf; he did so with good success, and it was his last labour of love; for returning to London on horseback, through heavy rain, a fever ensued, which, after ten, days, proved fatal.

He died at the house of his friend Mr. Stradwick, a grocer, at the sign of the Star, on Snow Hill, and was buried in that friend's vault in Bunhill Fields burial-ground, which the Dissenters regard as their Campo Santo,-and especially for his sake. It is said that many have made it their desire to be interred; as near as possible to the spot where his remains are deposited. His age and the date of his decease are thus recorded in his epitaph. Mr. John Bunyan, Author of the Pilgrim's Progress. ob. 12 Aug. 1688, æt. 60.

The Pilgrim's Progress now is finished,

And Death has laid him in his earthly bed.

It appears, that at the time of his death, the Lord Mayor, * Sir John Shorter, was one of his London flock. But though he had obtained favour among the magistracy, he was not one of those Nonconformists who were duped by the insidious liberality of the Government at that time, and lent their aid to measures which were intended for the destruction of the Protestant faith. "It is said, that he clearly saw through the designs of the court in favour of Popery," (blind indeed must they have been who did not!) when James granted his indulgence to the Dissenters; and that " he advised his brethren to avail themselves of the sunshine by diligent endeavours to spread the Gospel, and to prepare for an approaching storm by fasting and prayer." "He foresaw," says the Baptist Minister who added a supplement to his account of his own life, "all the advantages that could redound to the Dissenters, would have been no more than what

September 6, 1668. "Few days before died Bunian his Lordship's teacher, or chaplain; a man said to be gifted in that way, though once a cobler." Ellis' Correspondence. Vol. 2. 161.

e

Polyphemus, the monstrous Giant of Sicily, would have allowed Ulysses, to wit, 'that he would eat his men first, and do him the favour of being eaten last.'"-" When Regulators went into all cities and towns corporate to new model the magistracy, by turning out some and putting in others," Bunyan laboured zealously with his congregation "to prevent their being imposed on in that kind. And when a great man in those days, coming to Bedford upon some such errand, sent for him, (as was supposed,) to give him a place of public trust, he would by no means come at him, but sent his excuse."

His earliest biographer says also, that "though by reason of the many losses he sustained by imprisonment and spoil, his chargeable sickness, &c., his earthly treasure swelled not to excess, yet he always had sufficient to live decently and creditably." But all that Bunyan had to lose by "spoil," was his occupation as a tinker, which fortunately for him and the world was put an end to earlier than in the course of his Preacher's progress he could otherwise have cast it off. That progress raised him to a station of respectability and comfort; and he was too wise and too religious a man to desire riches, either for himself or his children. When a wealthy London citizen offered to take one of his sons as an apprentice without a premium, he declined the friendly and advantageous offer, saying, "God did not send me to advance my family, but to preach the Gospel." No doubt he saw something in the business itself, or in the way of life to which it led, unfavourable to the moral character.

His widow put forth an advertisement, stating her inability to print the writings which he left unpublished. They are probably included in the folio edition of his works which was published in 1692, the year of her decease, by Bunyan's successor at Bedford, Ebenezer Chandler, and John Wilson, a brother minister of the same sect, who went in Bunyan's lifetime from the Bedford congregation to be the first pastor of a Baptist flock at Hitchin.

Three children survived him; there were none by the second marriage; and the blind daughter, the only one whom it might have troubled him to leave with a scanty provision, happily died before him. He is said to have kept up "a very strict discipline