Old Portraits and Modern Sketches; Personal Sketches and Tributes; Historical Papers | Page 3

pedlaress. So marches he all over England, with his bag and
baggage; his conversation is irreprovable, for he is always mending. He
observes truly the statutes, and therefore had rather steal than beg. He is
so strong an enemy of idleness, that in mending one hole he would
rather make three than want work; and when he hath done, he throws
the wallet of his faults behind him. His tongue is very voluble, which,
with canting, proves him a linguist. He is entertained in every place, yet
enters no farther than the door, to avoid suspicion. To conclude, if he
escape Tyburn and Banbury, he dies a beggar."
Truly, but a poor beginning for a pious life was the youth of John
Bunyan. As might have been expected, he was a wild, reckless,
swearing boy, as his father doubtless was before him. "It was my
delight," says he, "to be taken captive by the Devil. I had few equals,

both for cursing and swearing, lying and blaspheming." Yet, in his
ignorance and darkness, his powerful imagination early lent terror to
the reproaches of conscience. He was scared, even in childhood, with
dreams of hell and apparitions of devils. Troubled with fears of eternal
fire, and the malignant demons who fed it in the regions of despair, he
says that he often wished either that there was no hell, or that he had
been born a devil himself, that he might be a tormentor rather than one
of the tormented.
At an early age he appears to have married. His wife was as poor as
himself, for he tells us that they had not so much as a dish or spoon
between them; but she brought with her two books on religious subjects,
the reading of which seems to have had no slight degree of influence on
his mind. He went to church regularly, adored the priest and all things
pertaining to his office, being, as he says, "overrun with superstition."
On one occasion, a sermon was preached against the breach of the
Sabbath by sports or labor, which struck him at the moment as
especially designed for himself; but by the time he had finished his
dinner he was prepared to "shake it out of his mind, and return to his
sports and gaming."
"But the same day," he continues, "as I was in the midst of a game of
cat, and having struck it one blow from the hole, just as I was about to
strike it a second time, a voice did suddenly dart from Heaven into my
soul, which said, 'Wilt thou leave thy sins and go to heaven, or have thy
sins and go to hell?' At this, I was put to an exceeding maze; wherefore,
leaving my cat upon the ground, I looked up to Heaven, and it was as if
I had, with the eyes of my understanding, seen the Lord Jesus look
down upon me, as being very hotly displeased with me, and as if He
did severely threaten me with some grievous punishment for those and
other ungodly practices.
"I had no sooner thus conceived in my mind, but suddenly this
conclusion fastened on my spirit, (for the former hint did set my sins
again before my face,) that I had been a great and grievous sinner, and
that it was now too late for me to look after Heaven; for Christ would
not forgive me nor pardon my transgressions. Then, while I was

thinking of it, and fearing lest it should be so, I felt my heart sink in
despair, concluding it was too late; and therefore I resolved in my mind
to go on in sin; for, thought I, if the case be thus, my state is surely
miserable; miserable if I leave my sins, and but miserable if I follow
them; I can but be damned; and if I must be so, I had as good be
damned for many sins as be damned for few."
The reader of Pilgrim's Progress cannot fail here to call to mind the
wicked suggestions of the Giant to Christian, in the dungeon of
Doubting Castle.
"I returned," he says, "desperately to my sport again; and I well
remember, that presently this kind of despair did so possess my soul,
that I was persuaded I could never attain to other comfort than what I
should get in sin; for Heaven was gone already, so that on that I must
not think; wherefore, I found within me great desire to take my fill of
sin, that I might taste the sweetness of it; and I made as much haste as I
could to fill my belly with its delicates, lest I should die before I had
my desires; for that I feared greatly. In these things,