CIHM Microfiche Series (Monograplis) ICI\1H Collection de microfiches (monographles) Canadian Institute tor Historical Microreproductions / Instltut Canadian de microreproductions historiques I %/N»Y.^^ . VI. Hl'NYAN. Johnson. Baoon. IX. CllAl OK.K. liA.MIl. 1)K (^m.SOKY. XII. TllADKI'llAY. Al'KlhON. SllKUIDAN. X III. Kka:'6. Hawtj OKNK. CABI.YIJt. Copyright, 1894. bv IIaupkr ^: Brothkrs. n U N Y A N By JAMES ANTHONY FllOUDE 15 I CONTENTS. CHAPTKR I. PAiiH KAKLY MFR 1 CHAPTER II. CDWICTION OF SIN 10 CEAPTKR III. "(iUACK ABOUXDINO" 3."> CHAPTER IV. »;ai.i. to tiik ministry 52 CHAPTER V. AKUEST AND TRIAL 6f> CHAPTER VI. THE nKDFOUD OAOI. . 77 CONTKNTS. CHAITKU VI!. I.IFK AND DKATll Ol' MK. IIAUMAN. . CMfAPTHK' VIII. "Tin: linl.Y WAll' I • • ClIAPTKU IX. •«TiiK nuiKiM'.s puooiir.ss" CIIAl'TEK X. LAST DAYS ANU DK-VITl ...««»•• PAOK ir.i . . 149 , . .170 ir.i . 149 . 170 i BUNYAN. CHAPTER I. EARLY LIFE. " I WAS of a low and inconsiderable generation, my fa- ther's hoiase being of that rank that is meanest and most despised of all families in the land." " I never went to school, to xVristotle or Plato, but was brought up in my father's house in a very mean condition, among a com- pany of poor countrymen." " Nevertheless, I bless God that by this door He brought me into the world to par- take of the grace and life that is by Christ in His Gospel." This i he account given -f himself and his origin by a man wuose writings have for two centuries affected the spiritual opinions of the English race in every part of the world more powerfully than any book or books, except the Bible. John Bunyan was born at Elstow, a village near Bed- ford, in the year 1028, It was a memorable epoch in English history, for in that year the House of Commons extorted the consent of Charles I. to the Petition of Right. The stir of politics, however, did not reach the humble household into which the little boy was introduced. His father was hardly occupied in earning bread for his wife and children as a mender of pots and kettles : a tinker— I3UNYAN. [chap. working in nciglibours' houses or at lionio, at such busi- ness as iiiio-lit bo brought to liini. " The Bunyans," says H friend, " were of the national religion, as men of that calling commonly were," Bunyan himself, in a passage which has been always understood to refer to his father, describes him " as an honest, poor labouring man, who, like x\dam unparadised, had all the world to get his bread in, and was very careful to maintain his family." In those days there were no village schools in England ; the educa- tion of the poor was an apprenticeship to agriculture or handicraft ; their religion they learnt at home or in church. Young Bunyan w%'is more fortunate. In Bedford there was a grammar school, wliich had been founded in Qnecn Mary's time by the Lord Mayor of London, Sir William JIarper. Hither, when he was old enough to walk to and fro, over the mile of road between Elstow and Bedford, the cliild was sent, if not to learn Aristotle and Plato, to learn at least " to read and write according to the rate of other poor men's children." If religion was not taught at school, it was tauglit with some care in the cottages and farmhouses by parents and masters. It was common in many parts of England, as late as the end of the last century, for the farmers to gather their apprentices about them on Sunday afternoons, and to teach them the Catechism. Rude as was Bunyan's home, religious notions of some kind had been early and vividly impressed upon him. lie caught, indeed, the or- dinary liabits of the boys among whom he was thrown. lie learnt to use bad language, and he often lied. When i\ child's imagination is exceptionally active, the tempta- tions to untruth are correspondingly powerful. The in- ventive faculty has its dangers, and Bunyan was eminently gifted in tliat way. He was a violent, passionate boy be- ■ J EARLY LIFE. sides, and thus he says of liimscif tliat for lying and swear- ing lie liad no equal, and that liis parents dfd not suffi- ciently correct liini. Wickedness, he declares in liis own remorseful story of liis early years, became a second nature to liiin. But the estimate wliich a man forms of liimself in later life, if ho has arrived at any strong abhorrence of moral evil, is harsher than others at the time would liave been likely to have formed. Even then tlie poor child's conscience must have been curiously sensitive, and it re- venged itself upon him in singular tortures. " My sins," he says, " did so offend the Lord that even in my -liildhood lie did scare and affright me with fear- ful dreams, and did terrify me with dreadful visions. I have been in my bed greatly afflicted while asleep, with apprehensions of devils and wicked spirits, who still, as I then thought, laboured to draw me away with tliem, of which I could never be rid. I was afflicted with thoughts of the Day of Judgment night and day, trembling at"the thoughts of tlie fearful torments of hell fire." When, at ten years old, he was running about with his companions in "his sports and childish vanities," tlicsc terrors contin- ually recurred to him, yet "he would not let go his sins." Such a boy required rather to be encouraged than cliecked in seeking innocent amusements. Swearino- and lying were definite faults which ought to have been cor- rected ; but his parents, perhaps, saw that there was some- thing unusual in the child. To them he probably ap- peared not worse than other boys, but considerably better. T!iey may have thought it more likely that he would con- quer his own bad inclinations by his own efforts, than that they could mend him by rough rebukes. When he left school he would naturally have been bound apprentice, but his father brought him up at Jiis 1* ^ BUNTAN. [CHAI'. own trade. Thus lie lived at home, and cjrew to manhood there, forming his ideas of men and things out of such opportunities as the Elstow neighbourhood afforded. From the time when the Reformation brouglit them a translation of it, the Bible was the book most read — it was often the only book which was read — in humble English homes. Familiarity with the words had not yet trampled the sacred writings into practical barrenness. No doubts or questions had yet risen about the Bible's nature or origin. It was received as the authentic word of God Himself. The Old and New Testament alike rep- resented the world as the scene of a struggle between good and evil spirits; and thus every ordinary incident of daily life was an instance or illustration of God's provi- dence. This was the universal popular belief, not admit- ted only by the intellect, but accepted and realised by the imagination. No one questioned it, save a few speculative philosophers in their closets. The statesman in the House of Commons, the judge on the Bench, the peasant in a midland vilhige, interpreted litci-ally by this rule the phe- nomena which they experienced or saw. They not only believed that God had miraculously governed the Israelites, but they believed that as directly and immediately He governed England in the seventeenth century. They not only believed that there had been a witch at Endor, but they believed that there were witches in their own villages, who had made compacts with the devil himself. They believed that the devil still literally walked the earth like a roaring lion ; that he and the evil angels were perpetually labouring to destroy the souls of men ; and that God was equally busy overthrowing the devil's work, and bringing sin and crimes to eventual punishment. In this lirt-ht the common events of life were actually 1] EARLY LIFE. looked at and understood, and tlic air was filled with anec- dotes so told as to illustrate the belief. These stories and these experiences were Bunyan's early mental food. One of them, which had deeply impressed the imagination of the Midland counties, was the story of " Old Tod." This man came one day into court, in the Summer Assizes at Bedford, "all in a dung sweat," to demand justice upon liimself as a felon. No one had accused him, but God's judgment was not to be escaped, and he was forced to ac- cuse himself. " xMy Lord," said Old Tod to the judge, " I have been a thief from my childhood. I have been a thief ever since. There has not been a robbery committed these many years, within so many miles of this town, but T have been privy to it." The judge, after a conference, agreed to indict him of certain felonies which lie had acknowl- edged. He pleaded guilty, implicating his wife along with him, and they were both hanged. An intense belief in the moral government of the world creates what it insists upon. Horror at sin forces the sinner to confess it, and makes others eager to punish it. "God's revenge against nuirder and adultery" becomes thus an actual fact, and justifies the conviction in which it rises. Bunyan was specially attentive to accounts of judg- ments upon swearing, to which he was himself addicted. He tells a story of a man at Wimbledon, who, after utter- ing some strange blasphemy, was struck with sickness, and died cursing. Another such scene he probably witnessed himself," and never forgot. An alehouse-keeper in the neighbourhood of Elstow had a son- who was half-witted. The favourite amusement, when a party was collected drink- • The story is told by Mr. Attentive in the IJfe of Mr. Badman ; but It IS almost certain tliat Bunyan was relating his own experience. 6 BUNYAN. [chap. iiii^, was for tlic futlicr to provoke the lad'.s tcini)er, and for the lad to curse his father and wisli tlie devil had him. The devil at last did have the alehouse-keeper, and rent and tore him till he died. " 1," says Bunyan, " was eye and ear witness of what I here say. I have heard Ned in his roguery cursing his father, and his father laughing thereat most heartily, still provoking of Ned to curse that his mirth might be increased. I saw his father also when he was posscFsed. I saw him in one of his fits, and saw Ins flesh as it was thought gathered up in a heap ahout the bigness of half an egg, to the unutterable torture and affliction of the old man. There was also one Freeman, who was more than an ordinary doctor, sent for to cast out the devil, and I w;is there when he attempted to do it. The manner whereof was this. They had the possessed in an outroom,and laid him upon his belly upon a form, with his head hanging down over the form's end. Then they bound him down thereto ; wliich done, they set a pan of coals under his mouth, and put something therein which made a great smoke — by this means, as it was said, to fetch out the devil. There they kept the man till he was almost smothered in the smoke, but no devil came out of him, at which Freeman was somewhat abashed, the man greatly afflicted, and I made to go away wondering and fearing. In a little time, therefore, that which possessed the man carried him out of the world, according to the cursed wishes of his son." The wretched alehouse-keeper's life was probably sacri- ficed in this attempt to dispossess the devil. But the inci- dent would naturally leave its mark on the mind of an im- pressionable boy. Bunyan ceased to frequent such places after he began to lead a religious life. The story, there- fore, most likely belongs to the experiences of his first [fllAP. >•] EARLY LIFE. temper, smd evil had liitn. per. and rent i^n, " was e}'o heard Ned in her laughing to curse tliat ler also when fits, and saw a heap ahout e torture and one Freeman, t for to cast pted to do it. i possessed in 1 a form, with . Then they set a pan of tlicrein which I was said, to an till he was 1 came out of >hed, the man ondering and lich possessed ording to the )robably sacri- But the inci- lind of an ini- nt such places c story, therc- 2s of his first I youth after lie left school ; and there may have been many niore of a similar kind, for, except that he was steady at his trade, he grew up a wild lad, the ringleader of the vil- lage apprentices in all manner of mischief, lie had no books, except a life of Sir Bevis of Southampton, which would not tend to sober him ; indeed, he soon forgot all that he had learnt at school, and took to amusements and doubtful adventures, orchard - robbing, perhaps, or poach- ing, since he hints that he might have brought himself within reach of the law. In the most passionate language of self-abhorrence, he accuses himself of all manner ofsin" , yet it is improbable that he appeared to others what in later life he appeared to himself, lie judged his own conduct as he believed that it was regarded by his Maker, by whom he supposed eternal torment to have been assign- ed as the just retribution for the lightest offence. Yetlie was never drunk. He who never forgot anything with which he could charge himself, would not have passed over drunkenness, if ho could remember that he had been guilty of it; and he distinctly asserts, also, that he was never in a single instance unchaste. In our days, a rough tinker who could say as much for hims<>lf after he had grown to manhood would be regarded as a model of self-restraint. If, in Bedford and the neighbourhood, there was no youn^^ nian more vicious than Bunyan, the moral standard of an English town in the seventeenth century must have been higher than believers in Progress will be pleased to allow. He declares that he was without God m the world, and in the sense which he afterwards attached to the word this was probably true. But serious thoughts seldom ceased to work in him. Dreams only reproduce the forms and feehngs with which the waking imagination is most en- gaged. Bunyan'a rest continued to be haunted with the BUNYAN. [chap. If phantoms which had tornfiod him wlion a child. He start od in his sleep, and frightened tlic family witli his cries, lie saw evil spiiits in monstrous shapes, and fiends bl< flames out of their nostrils. " Once," says a biogrn^.iicis who knew liim well, and liad heard the story of his visions from Jiis own lips, " l,e dreamed that he saw the face of heaven as it were on fire, tlie firmament eracklinn- and shiverino- with the noise of mighty thunder, and an^arch- ang-el flew in the midst of heaven, sounding,a trumpet, ;uid a glorious throne was seated in the east, wliereon sat One in brightness like the morning star. Upon which he, think- ing it was the end of the world, fell upon his knees and said, 'Oh, Lord, have mercy on me! What diall I do? The Day of Judgment is come, and 1 am not prepared.' " At ajiothcr time " he dreamed that lie was in a pleasant place jovial and rioting, when an earthquake rent the earth, out of which came bloody flames, and the figures of men tossed up in globes of fire, and falling dowm again with horrible cries and shrieks and execrations, while devils mingled among them, and laughed aloud at their torments. As he stood trembling, the earth sank under him, and a circle of flames embraced him. But when he fancied he was at the point to perish. One in shining white raiment descended and plucked him out of that dreadful place, while the devils cried after him to take him to the punish- ment which his sins had deserved. Yet he escaped the danger, and leapt for joy when he awoke and found it was a dream." Mr. Southey, wlio thinks wisely that Bunyan's biogra- phers have exaggerated his early faults, considers tha^ at worst he was a sort of " blackguard." This, too, is a wrong word. Young village blackguards do not dream of archangels flying through the midst of heaven, nor were 'J EAULV LIFE. t^liild. lie start- ■' with liis cries. d fiends bl* .ur t's fi biogrn^/ii'cr, ry of his visions saw tlic face of t cracldino- and er, and an arch- :,a trumpet, lunl Iiereon sat One rthicli he, think- 1 his knees and lat diall I do? Dt prejtared.' " !is in a pleasant i rent the earth, figures of men vvn again with IS, wliile devils their torments, dcr him, and a he fancied he white raiment ircadful place, to the punish- le escaped the d found it was nyan's Liogra- isiders that at This, too, is a do not dream aven, nor were these imaginations invented afterwards, or rhetorically ex- iggerated. IJunyan was undoubtedly given to story-tell- 1 ing as a boy, and the recollection of it made 1 iim peculiar- ly scrupulous in his statements in later life. One trait he mention:, of himself which no one would liave thought of who had not experienced the feeling, yet every person can understand it and sympathise with it. These spectres and hobgoblins drove him wild. lie says, " I was so ovcrcon)e with despair of life and heaven, that I should often wish either that there had been no hell, or that I had been a devil; supposing that they were only tormentors, and that, if it must needs be that I went thither, I might be rather a tormentor than tormented myself." The visions at last ceased. God left him to himself, as he puts it, and gave him over to his own wicked inclina- tions. He fell, he says, into all kinds of vice and un- godliness without further check. The expression is very strong, yet when we look for particulars we can find only that lie was fond of gaujcs which Puritan preciseness dis- approved, lie had high animal spirits, and engaged in lawless enterprises. Once or twice he nearly lost his life. He is sparing of details of his outward history, for he re- garded it as nothing but vanity ; but his escapes from death were providences, and therefore he mentions them, lie must have gone to the coast somewhere, for ho was once almost drowned in a creek of the sea. lie fell out of a boat into the river at another time, and it seems that he could not swim. Afterwards he seized hold of an ad- der, and was not bitten by it. These mercies were sent as warnings, but he says that he was too careless to profit by them, lie thought that he had forgotten God alto- gether, and yet it is plain that he had not forgotten. A bad young man, who has shaken off religion because it is 10 DUX VAX. [CIIAP, a restraint, observes with malicious aimisciiu'iit tlu; faults of persons wjio make a profession of religion. Ho infers that they do not really believe it, and only ditfor from their neij^dibours in being hypocrites. Bunyan notes this disposition in his own history of Mr. Dadnian. Of him- self he s;,ys: "Though I could sin with delight and case, and take pleasure in the villanies of my eompanions, eren then, if I saw wicked things done by them that professed goodness, it would make my spirit tremble. Once, wiien I was in the height of my vanity, hearing one swear that was reckoned a religious man, it made my heart to ache." lie was now seventeen, and wo can form a tolerably ac- curate picture of him — a tall, active lad, working as his father's apprentice at his pots and kettles, igmuant of books, and with no notion of the world beyoml what he could learn in his daily drudgery, and the talk of the ale- house and the village green; inventing lies to amuse liis eompanions, and swearing that they were true; playing bowls and tipcat, ready for any reckless action, and al- ways a leader in it, yet all the while singularly pure from the more brutal forms of vice, and haunted with feverish thoughts, which he tried to forget in amusements. It has been the fashion to take his account of himself literally, and represent him as the worst of reprobates, in order to magjiify the effects of his conversion, and perhaps to make intelligible to his admiring followers the reproaches which he heaps upon himself. They may have felt that they could not be wrong in explaining his own language in the only sense in which they could attach a mt"ming to it. Vet, sitmer though he may have been, like all the^'rest of us, his sins were not the sins of coarseness and vulgarity. They were the sins of a youth of sensitive nature and very peculiar gifts — gifts which brought special temptations [CIIAP. inciit tli(! faults ion. Ho infers Illy dilfor from iiyan notos this man. Of him- I'lij^'lit and case, mipanioiis, owvti that professed ■. Once, wlien one swear that leart to ache." a tolerably ac- vvorking as liis ;s, i[,niorant of nyond what he talk of the ale- 5 to amuse liis true ; playini,^ action, and al- irly pure from 1 with feverish ments. It has inself literally, 38, in order to rhaps to make roaches which felt that they nguatre in the iieaniiiy; to it. all the rest of and vulgarity, itun; and very 1 temptations '•] EARLY LIFE. 11 with them, and inclined liim to bo careless and desperate, yet from causes singularly unlike those which arc usually operati\e in dissipated and uneducated boys. It was now the year 1045. Naseby Field was near, and the first Civil War was drawing to its close. At this cri- sis Bunyan was, as he says, drawn to be a soldier; and it is extremely characteristic of him and of the body to which he belonged, that he leaves us to guess on which side he served. He does not tell us himself. His friends in after- life did not care to ask him, or he to inform them, or else they also thought the matter of too small importance to bo worth mentioning with exactness. There were two tra- ditions, and his biographers chose between them as we do. Close as the connection was in that great struggle between civil and religious liberty— flung as Bunyan was flung into the very centre of the conflict between the English people and the Crown and Church and aristocracy— victim as he was himself of intolerance and persecution, he never but once took any political part, and then only in signing an address to Cromwell. Ho never showed any actrve inter- est in political questions ; and if he spoke on such ques- tions at all after the Restoration, it was to advise submis- sion to the Stuart Government. By the side of the stu- pendous issues of human life, such miserable riffhts as men might pretend to in this world wx?re not worth contending for. The only rir/ht of man that he thought much about, was the right to be eternally damned if lie did not lay hold of grace. King and subject were alike creatures, whose sole significance lay in their individual immortal souls. Their relations with one another upon earth were nothing in the presence of the awful judgment which awaited them both. Thus, whether Bunyan's brief career in the array was under Charles or under Fairfax must re- B <2 18 BUNYAX. [chap. main (loiil)tfiil. IVul.iibility is on tho side of Jiis Imving been with the Royalists. His father was of "the national rdijrion." Ho hinisdf had as yet no special convictionH of iiis own. John (JitToid, the Haptist ujinister at Hed- foid, had btrn a lioyalist. Tiu- only incident which JJun- yan speaks of connected with his military experience points in tho s-inio direction. " When I was a soldier," JWf says, "I was with others drawn ont to jro to such a piwo to besiL-ii;e it. Hnt wlien I was just ready to ^o, one of tho company desire.l to go in my room. Cominir to the siejro as he stood sentinel ho was shot in tho licart with a innsket bullet and died." Tradition ayrees that the place to which these words refer was Leicester. Leices- ter was stormed by tho Kino-'s troops a few days b( fore the battle of Naseby. It was recovered afterwards by tlie Parliamentarians, but on the second occasion there was no Huhting, as it capitulated without a shot being fired. Mr. Carlylo supposes that Bunyan was not ^^ th tlie attacking party, but was in the town as one of tho garrison, and was taken prisoner there. IJut this cannot bo, iov he says ex- pressly that he was one of tho besiegers. Legend gathers freely about eminent men, about men especially who are eminent in religion, whetlcr they arc Catholic or Protes- tant.^ Lord Macaulay is not only positive that the liero of tho English Dissenters fought on the side of the Common- wealth, but he says, witliout a word of caution on tlic im- perfection of the evidence, " His Greatheart, his Captain Boanerges, and his Captain Credence, arc evidently por- traits of which the originals were among those martial saints who fought and expounded in Fairfax's army."' If the martial saints had impressed Bunyan so deeply, ' ^'fi of BiDii/an : Collected Works, vol. vii. p. 299. '■^4 »•] KAUhV LIFE. lo of Itis linvini^ »f "the imtioDiil '•'iai convictions linistcr at I'.etl- !ont which Unn- tary cxpcriciico was a soldier," o jLjo to such ft oady to ^o, one in. C'oniinii; to 5t in the heart ion agrees that iccstcr. Ivcices- cw days lj( fore ;cr\vurds by the •n there was no ing tired. Mr. Ii the attacking rrison, and was iov lie says ex- Legend gathers icialiy wlio are oiic or Protes- liat the Ijero of f tlio Common- ion on the im- rt, his Captain evidently por- thoso martial i's army.'" yan so deeply, i. p. 299. it is inconccivahle that ho should liavo made hision to his militarv service tl He refc 18 no more nl- lan '" this brief passage, le refers to tiie siege and all connected with it merely fts another occasion of his owr- providential escapes from ucalh. Let tl.>- truth of this be what it may, the troop t<. which he beloM.vd was .soon disbanded. He returned at the end of the yoar to his tinker's work at Elstow mueh as he liad left It. The saint>, if ho had met with saints, had not converted him. " I sinned still," ho says, - and gr-w more and more rebelli, ns against (iod and careless of my own salvation." An in)portant change of another kind, how- over, lay before him. Young as he was, he married. His fncM.ds advised it, for they thought that marriage would "mkc him steady. The step was less imprudent than it would have been had IJunyan been in a higher rank of life, or had aimed at rising into it. The girl whom he ohose was a poor orphan, but she had been 'careful I v and piously brought up, and from her acceptance of' him sometlung n.ore u.ay be inferred al...ut his character.' Had he been a dissolute, idle scamp, it is unlikely that a respectable woman would have become bis wife when he was a „,ere boy. His sins, whatever the^e were, had not mjured las outward circumstances ; it is cl. ,- that all alon-. ho worked skilfully and industriously at his tinkering ta.si"- noss. He had none of the habits which bring men to beg- gar . l^rom the begimiing of his life to th. end of i;, he was a prudent, careful man, and, considering the station to which he belonged, a very successful man "I lighted on a wife," he says, "whose father was counted godly. We came together as poor as noor mio-ht l>o, not having so much household stuff as a dish or a spoon between us. But she had for her portion two I 14 BUNYAX. [chap. books, The Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven, and The Practice of Piety, which lici- fatlier had loft licr when lie died. In these two books I sometimes read with her. I found some tilings pleasing to me, but all this while I met with no conviction. She often told me what a godly man her father was; Iiow he would reprove and correct vice both in his house and among his neighbours ; what a strict and holy life he lived in his day, both in word and deed. These books, though they did not reach my heart, did light in me some desire to religion." There was still an i:stablished Church in England, and the constitution of it had not yet been altered. The Pres- byterian platform threatened to take the place of Episco- pacy, and soon did take it ; but the clergyman was still a priest, and was still regarded with pious veneration in the country districts as a semi-supernatural being. The altar yet stood in its place, the minister still appeared in his surplice, and the Prayers of the Liturgy continued to be read or intoned. The old familiar beJls, Catholic as they were in all the emotions which they suggested, called the congregation together with their musical peal, though in the midst of triumphant Puritanism. The Book of Sports, which, under an order from Charles I., had been read regularly in Church, had in 1644 been laid under a ban ; but the gloom of a Presbyterian Sunday was, is, and for ever will be detestable to the natural man ; and the Elstow population gathered persistently after service on the village green for their dancing, and their leaping, and their archery. Long habit cannot be transformed in a day by an Edict of Council, and amidst army manifestoes and battles of Marston Moor, and a king dethroned and imprisoned, old English life in Bedfordshire preserved its familiar features. These Sunday sports had been a special [CIIAP. Heaven, and 21ie eft her when ho cad with lior. I this while I met hat a godly man and correct vice rs ; what a strict word and deed, 1 my lieart, did in England, and ;rcd. The Prcs- placc of Episco- ^man was still a cncration in the }ing. The altar appeared in his continued to be I^atholic as they uggested, called cal peal, though The Book of Ics I., had been en laid under a day was, is, and man ; and the ifter service on eir leaping, and ansformed in a my manifestoes dethroned and re preserved its d been a special I] EARLY LIFE. IS delight to Bunyan, and it is to them which he refers in the following passage, when speaking of his persistent wicked- ness. On his marriage he became regular and respectable in his habits. lie says, " I fell in with the religion of the times to go to church twice a day, very devoutly to say and sing as the others did, yet retaining my wicked life. Withal I was so overrun with the spirit of superstition that I adored with great devotion even all things, both the high place, priest, clerk, vestment, service, and what else belonging to the Church, counting all things holy therein contained, and especially the priest and clerk most happy and without doubt greatly blessed. This conceit grew so strong in my spirit that had I but seen a priest, though never so sordid and debauched in his life, I should find my spirit fall under him, reverence, and be knit to him their name, their garb, and work did so intoxicate and be- witch me." Surely if there were no other evidence, these words would show that the writer of them had never listened to the expositions of the martial saints. CHAPTER II, CONVICTION OF SIN. The Pilgrim's Progress is tlie history of the straggle of Imman nature to overcome temptation and sliake "off the bondage of sin, under tlio convictions which prevailed among serious men in England in the seventeenth century. The allegory is the life of its author cast in an imagina- tive form. Every step in Christian's journey had been first trodden by Bunyan himself; every pang of fear and shame, every spasm of despair, every breath of hope and consolation, which is there described, is but a reflexion as on a mirror from personal experience. It has spoken to the hearts of all later generations of Englishmen because It came from the heart ; because it is the true record of the genuine emotions of a human soul; and to such a record the emotions of other i;ieo will respond, as one stringed instrument vibrates responsively to another. The poet's power lies in creating sympathy ; but he cannot, however richly gifted, stir feelings which he has not him- self known in all their intensity. " Ut ridontibus arrident ita flentibus adflent Humani vultus. Si vis mc Here dolcndum est Primuin ipsi tibi." The religious history of man is essentially the same in all ages. It takes its rise in the duality of his nature. lie CUAP, II.] CONVICTION OF SIN, 17 arnev had been is an animal, and as an animal he desires bodily pleasure and shrinks from bodily pain. As a being capable of morality, he is conscious that, for him there exists a right and wrong. Something, whatever that something may be, binds him to choose one and avoid the other. This is his religion, his religatio, his obligation, in the sense in which the Romans, from whom we take it, used the word ; and obligation implies some superior power to which man owes obedience. The conflict between his two disposi- tions agitates his heart and perplexes his intellect. To do what the superior power requires of him, he iriust thwart his inclinations. He dreads punishment, if he neglects to do it. He invents methods by which he can indulge his appetites, and finds a substitute by which he can propi- tiate his invisible ruler or rulers. He offers sacrifices ; he institutes ceremonies and observances. This is the re- ligion of the body, the religion of fear. It is what we call superstition. In his nobler moods he feels that this is but to evade the difficulty. He perceives that the sac- rifice required is the sacrifice of himself. It is not the penalty for sin which he must fear, but the sin itself. He must conquer his own lower nature. He must detach his heart from his pleasures, and he must love good for its own sake, and because it is his only real good ; and this is spiritual religion or piety. Between these two forms of worship of the unseen, the human race has swayed to and fro from the first moment in which they learnt to discern between good and evil. Superstition attracts, because it is indulgent to immorality by providing means by which God can be pacified. But it carries its antidote along with it, for it keeps alive the sense of God's existence ; and when it has produced its natural effects, when the believer rests in his observances and lives practically as if 18 BUNYAX. [ciup. there was no God at all, the conscionco again awakes. Sacrifices and ceremonies become detested as idolatry, and religion becomes conviction of sin, a fiery determina- tion to fight with the whole soul against appetite, vanity, self-seeking, and every mean propensity which the most sensitive alarm can detect. The battle unhappily is at- tended with many vicissitudes. The victory, though practically it may be won, is never wholly won. The struggle brings with it every variety of emotion, alterna- tious of humility and confidence, despondency and hope. The essence of it is always the same— the effort of the higher nature to overcome the lower. The form of it varies from period to period, according to the conditions of the time, the temperament of different people, the conception of the character of the Supreme Power, which the state of knowledge enables men to form. It will bo found even when the puzzled intellect can see no light in Heaven at all, in the stern and silent fulfilment of moral duty. It will appear as enthusiasm; it will appear as asceticism ; it will appear wherever there is courage to sac- rifice personal enjoyment for a cause believed to be lioly. We must all live. We must all, as we suppose, in one shape or other, give account for our actions ; and accounts of the conflict are most individually interesting when it is an open wrestle with the enemy; as we find in the penances and austerities of the Catholic saints, or when the difiiculties of belief are confessed and detailed, as in David's Psalms, or in the Epistles of St. Paul. St. Paul, like the rest of mankind, found a law in his members warring against the law which was in his heart. The problem presented to liim was how one was to bo brought into subjection to the other, and the solution was by "the putting on of Christ." St. Paul's mind was charged with I [CIUP, again awakes, itcd as idolatry, fiery detcrniii)u- appetite, vanity, which the most unhappily is at- victory, thouo'h lolly won. The emotion, alterna- lency and hope, he effort of the The form of it » the conditions •ent people, the le Power, which )rm. It will be see no liglit in ilment of moral will appear as courage to sac- !vcd to be holy, suppose, in one » ; and accounts resting when it we find in the saints, or when [ detailed, as in Paul. St. Paul, n his members is heart. The s to be brought )n was by " the is charged with "•] CONVICTION 0^ SIN. 19 the ideas of Oriental and Greek philosophy then prevalent in the Roman Empire. His hearers understood him, be- cause he spoke in the language of the prevailing specula- tions. Wo who liave not the clue cannot, perhaps, per- fectly understand liira ; but his words have been variously interpreted as human intelligence has expanded, and have formed the basis of the t,vo great theologies which have been developed out of Christianity. The Christian relig- ion taught that evil could not be overcome by natural luiman strength The Son of God had come miraculously upon earth, had lived a life of stainless puriiy, and had been offered as a sacrifice to redeem men conditionally from tlie power of sin. The conditions, as English Prot- estant theology understands them, are nowhere more com- pletely represented than in The Pilf/rim's Progress. The Catholic theology, rising as it did in the two centuries im- mediately following St. Paul, approached, probably, nearer to what he really intended to say. Catholic theology, as a system, is a development of Platonism. The Platonists had discovered that the seat of moral evil was material substance. In matter, and therefore in the human body, there was either some in- herent imperfection, or some ingrained perversity and antagonism to good. The soul, so^long as it was attacked to the body, was necessarily infected by it ; and as human life on earth consisted in the connection of soul and body, every single man was necessarily subject to infirmity! Catholic theology accepted the position and formulated an escape from it. The evil in matter was a fact. It was explained by Adam's sin. But there it was. The taint was inherited by all Adam's posterity. The flesh of man was incurably vitiated, and if he was to be saved, a new body must be prepared for him. This Christ had done. 20 BUNYAN. [chap. That Christ's body was not as otlicr men's bodies was proved after his resurrection, when it showed itself inde- pendent of the limitations of extended substance. In virtue of these mysterious properties, it became the body of the Corr,oratc Church, into whioli believers were ad- mitted by bai)tism. The natural body was not at once destroyed, but a new element was introduced into it, by the power of which, assisted by ])enance, and mortifica- tion, and the spiritual food of the Eucharist, the grosser qualities were gradually subdued, and the corporeal system was changed. Then body and spirit became alike pure together, and the saint became capable of obedience, so perfect as not only to suffice for himself, but to supply th: wants of others. The corruptible put on incorruption. The bodies of the saints worked miracles, and their flesh was found unaffected by decay after hundreds of years. This belief, so long as it was sincerely held, issued nat- urally in characters of extreme beauty — of beauty so great as almost to demonstrate its truth. The purpose of it, so far as it affected action, was self-conque-t. Those who try with their whole souls to conquer themselves find the effort lightened by a conviction that they are receiving supernatural assistance ; and the form in which the Catho- lic theory supposed the assistrance to be given was at least perfectly innocent. But it is in the nature of human speculations, though they may have been entertained at first in entire good faith, to break down under trial, if they are not in conformity with faot. Catholic theology furnished Europe with a rule of faith and action which \asted 1500 years. For the last three centuries of that period it was changing from a religion into a superstition, till, from being the world's guide, it became its scandal. "The body of Christ" had become a kingdom of this [CIIAP. Ill CONVICTION OF SIN. 21 odics was tsolf indc- vnce. In the body were ad- it at once iito it, by mui'tifica- ic grosser 3al system dike pure ■dicnce, so to supply orruption. their tiesh f years, ssucd nat- ;y so great >e of it, so ^liosc wlio is find the receiving tlie Catho- 'as at least of luiman srtained at er trial, if c theology tion which ics of that ipcrstition, ts scandal. )m of tins world, insulting its subjects by the effrontery of its minis- ters, the insolence of its pretensions, the mountains of lies which it was teaching as sacred truths, Luther spoke ; and over half the Western world the Catholic Church collapsi'd, and a new theory and Christianity had to be cil)lc as His revealed word, in a fu^u'c judgment, in the fall of man, in the atonement made for sin by the death of Christ, and in the new life which was made possible by His resurrection. The change was in the conception of the method by which the atonement was imagined to be ei}icaci(jus. The material or sacramental view of it, though it lingered inconsistently in the mind even of Luther him- self, was substantially gone. New ideas adopted in en- thusiasm are necessarily extreme. The wrath of God was held to be inseparably and eternally attached to every act of sin, however infirm the sinner. That his nature could be changed, and that he could be mysiically strengthened l»y incorporation with Christ's body in the Church, was contrary to experience, and was no longer credible. The conscience of every man, in the Church or out of it, told him that he was daily and hourly offending. God's law demanded a life of perfect obedience, eternal death being the penalty of the lightest breach of it. No human being was capable of such perfect obedience. He could not do one single act which would endure so strict a scrutiny. All mankind were thus included under sin. The Catholic Purgatory was swept awaj . It had degenerated into a contrivance for feeding the priests with money, and it im- plied that human nature could in itself be renovated by its own sufferings. Thus nothing lay before the whole race except everlasting reprobation. But the door of hope had 22 BUNTAN. [chap. been opened on the cross of Christ, ('lirist liad done what man could never do. lie had fulfilled the law per- fectly. God was ready to accept Christ's perfect rii,'ht- eousness as a substitute for the righteo.,sness which in;ui was rcfjuircd to present to him, but could not. The con- ditions of acceptance were no loncjer sacraments or out- ward acts, or lame and impotent efforts after a moral life, but faith in what Christ had done; a complete self-abne- gation, a resio;ncd consciousness of utter unworthincss, and an unreserved acceptance of the mercy lield out throuo-h the Atonement. It mio-ht have been thounjht that since man was born so weak that it was impossible for him to do w^ at the law required, consideration would be had for his infirmity; that it was even dangerous to attribute to the Almighty a character so arbitrary as that lie would exact an accouut from his creatures which the creature's necessary inadequacy rendered him incapable of meeting. But the impetuosity of the new theology would listen to no such excuses. God was infinitely pure, and nothing impure could stand in his sight. Man, so long as he rest- ed on merit of his own, must be for ever excluded from his presence. lie must accept grace on the terms on which it was held out to him ; then, and then only, God would ex- tend his pity to him. lie was no longer a child of wrath : he was God's child. His infirmities remained, but they were constantly obliterated by the merits of Christ. And he had strength given to him, partially, at least, to overcome temptation, under which, but for that strength, he would have fallen. Though nothing which he could do could deserve reward, yet he received grace in proportion to the firmness of his belief; and his efforts after obedience, im- perfect though they might be, were accepted for Christ's sake. A good life, or a constant effort after a good life. "1* 4V [chap. I..] CONVICTION OF SIN. 28 ist had (lone 1 the law per- pcrfcot ritjlit- 38 wliicli man )t. The con- ncnts or out- u moral life, etc self-abno- orthincss, and out throuo-h lit that since e for him to Id be had for attribute to at lie would he creature's : of meeting. )uld listen to and nothing ig as he rest- ded from his i on which it )d would ex- ild of wrath : ed, but they Christ. And to overcome th, ho would Id do could irtion to the 3edience, im- for Christ's a good life, was still the object which a man was bound to labour after. Though giving no claim to pardon, still less for reward, it was the necessary fruit of a sense of what Christ had done, and of love and gratitude towards him. Good works were the test of saving faith ; and if there were no signs of them, the faith was barren: it was not real faith at all. This was the I'uritan belief in England in the seven- teenth century. The reason starts at it, but all religion is paradoxical to reason. God hates sin, yet sin exists. He is omnipotent, yet evil is not overcome. The will of man is free, or there can be no guilt ; yet the action of the will, HO far as experience can throw light on its operation, is as much determined by antecedent causes as every other nat- ural force. Prayer is addressed to a Being assumed to be omniscient ; who knows better what is good for us than we can know ; who sees our thoughts without requiring to hear them in words; whose will is Hxed and cannot be changed. Prayer, therefore, in the eye of reason, is an impertinence. The Puritan theology is not more open to objection on the ground of unreasonableness than the Catholic theology, or any other which regards man as answerable to God for his conduct. We must judge of a creed by its effects on charar*^cr, as we judge of the wholesomeness of food as it conu.ccs to bodily health. And the creed which swept like a wave through England at that time, and recom- mended itself to the noblest and most powerful intellects, produced also in those who accepted it a horror of sin, an enthusiasm for justice, purity, and manliness, which can bo paralleled only in the first age of Christianity. Cer- tainly there never was such a theory to take man's conceit out of him. He was a miserable wretch, so worthless at his best as to deserve everlasting perdition. If he was to be saved at all, he could be sa\ .. only by the unmerited Ml l! W'- 24 BUNYAN. [chap. gnicc of God. Ill liiinsflf ho wa? a cljild of tlio devil ; and licll, nut in metaphor, but in hard and palpatio fact, inevitably waited for him. This belief, or the atTeetation of this belief, eontiniies to bo professed, but without a real- isation of its tremendous meanini;. The form of words is repeated by multitudes who do not eare to think what they are sayini;. Who can measure the effect of such a con- viction u[)on men who wcro in earnest about their souls, ",vho were assured that this account of their situation wns actually true, and on whom, therefore, it bore with increas- ing weiujht in proportion to their sincerity? With these few prefatory words, I now return to Bun- yan. IIo had bcgtm to go regularly to church, and by church he meant the Church of England. The change in the constitution of it, even when it came, did not much al ter its practical character in the country districts. At El- stow, as we have seen, there was still a higli place ; then was still a liturgy ; tlicrc was still a surplice. The Church of England is a compromise bctv.(.cn the old tlieology and the new. The Bishops liave the apostolical succession, but many of them disbelieve that they derive any virtue from it. The clergyman is either a priest wlio can absolve men from sins, or he is a minister, aa in otlicr Protestant com- munions. The sacraments arc either means of grace or mere outward signs. A Christian is either saved by bap- tism or saved by fi.-ith, as he pleases to believe. In either case he may be a member of the Church of England. The effect of such uncertain utterances is to leave an impres- sion that, in defining such points closely, theologians are laying down lines of doctrines about subjects of which they know nothing, that the real truth of religion lies in what is common to the two theories, the obligation to lead a moral life ; and to this sensible view of their functions 11 '[ n.; i' th \ la 1 111 1 th 1 ot v^.^B sv M C H ro 1 no ^M 111 ■ L 1 ill I ill B .ti'' ^ B 1 w [chap. of the devil ; |)!il[),'iblo fact, ho atrootation vitliDut fi real- Ill of words is ink what they f such a con- it their souls, situation wrs I with increas- [)turn to Bun- luivh, and by ^'hc change in I not much al ricts. At El- 1 place ; then The Church theology and ucccssion, but y virtue from 1 absolve men otestant coni- i of grace or saved by bap- •e. In either ngland. The 'e an imprcs- eologians are ;cts of which iligion lies in gation to lead icir functions "•] CONVICTION OF SIN. 2« tlio bishops and clergy had, in fact, gradually .»i .»'ed in the last century, when the revival of what is callc' irtK 4ne8s, first in the form of Evangolicalism, and th n Anglo-Cn tholicism, awoke again the old coiitrovcrsii' To a man of fervid temperament suddenly convinced of sin, incapable -of being satisfied with ambiguous an- swers to ([uestions which mean life or death to him, the Church of England has little to say. If he is quiet and reasonable, he finds in it all that ho desires. Enthusiastic ages and enthusiastical temperaments demand something more comj)lete and consistent. The clergy under the Long rarliament caught partially the tone of the prevail- ing spirit. The reading of the Jiouk of Sjiorts had been interdicted, and from their pulpits they lectured their con- gregations on the ungodliness of the Sabbath amusements. IJut the congregations were slow to listen, and the sports went on. One Sunday morning, wh.en Bunyan was at church with his wife, a sermon was delivered on this subject. It seem- ed to be especially addressed to himself, and it much af- fected him. lie shook oiT the impression, and after din- ner he went as usual to the green. lie was on the point of striking at a ball when the thought rushed across his mind, W\\t thou leave thy sins and go to heaven, or have thy sins and go to hell ? He looked up. The reflection of his own emotion was before him in visible form. lie imagined that he saw Christ himself looking down at him from the sky. But he concluded that it was too late for him to repent, lie was past pardon. He was sure to be damned, and he might as well be damned for many sins as fur few. Sin, at all events, was pleasant, the only pleas- ant thing that he knew ; therefore he would talvc his fill of it. The sin was the game, and nothing but the game. He '^', ^K 1 20 IIUNYAX. ( vHAP. conti..u.>.l t.) play, but the Puritan scnsitivc-noss had taken hold of l.itn. An artiHcial offence had become a real of- fence when his conscience was wounded by it. He was reckless and desperate. ''This temptation of the devil," he says, " is more usual ainonir poor creatures than many are aware of. It contin- ued with me al...ut a month or more; but one day, as I was standin-i at a nei.^hbour's shop-witulow, and there curs- injr and swearini,^ after my wonted manner, there sat with- iifthe woman of the house and heard mo, who, though she was a loose and ungodly wretch, protested that I swore and cursed at such a rate that she trembled to hear me. I was able to spoil all the youths in a whoK- town. At this reproof I was silenced and put to secret shame, and that too, as I thouoht, before the Uod of heaven. 1 stood l,aii..in!.' down my head, and wishing that I might bo n little child, that my father might learn me to speak with- out this wicked sin of swearing; for, thought 1,1 am so accustomed to it that it is vain to think of a reformat tion." ^ . These words have been sometimes taken as a rejection on Bunvan's own father, as if he had not sulliciently checked'thc first symptoms of a bad habit. If this was so, too much may be easily made of it. The language in the hoi ^ of ignorant Nvorkmcn is seldom select. They have no. .. large vocabulary, and the words which they use do not mean what they seem to mean. But so sharp and sudden remorse speaks remarkably for Bunyan himself. At this time he could have been barely twenty years old, and already he was quick to sec when he was doing wrong, to be sorry for it, and to wish that he could do better. Vain the effort seemed to him, yet from that moment "he did leave off swearing, to his own great won- II. CONVICTION OF SIN. 87 ,lor ;" ami li»- fniuul " tl.nt lie couM spoak botU-r and more nloasiUktlv thrill ho wledj^e, or moral eon.|uost of nelf, ut vaoh furwanl hU'I. v/r.ch ho takes ho i^rows nioro con- Hcions of his Hhortconiin,us. It in thus with his whoK; ca- reer, and those wlio rise hijihcst are least satisfied with th<>i'nselvos. Very simp'-y •^""y"" tells the story of his n,o-<)|,]," he said, " what would T not liave given for it ! Had i had a wliolc world it had all gone ten thousand times over for this, that my soul might have been in a converted state. But, oh! I was made sick by that, saying of (Christ: 'lie called to Iliiii whom He would, and they came to Ilim,' I feared He would not call me." Election, conversion, day of grace, coming to Christ, have been pawed and lingered by unctuous hands for now two hundred years. The bloom is gone from the flower. The plumage, once shining with hues direct from lieaven, is soiled and bedraggled. The most solemn of all realities have been degraded into the passwords of technical the- ology. In r.unyau's day, in camp and council chamber, in High Courts of rarliameiit, and among the poor drudges in English villages, they were still radiant with spiritual meaning. The dialect may alter; l)ut if man is more than a brief floating bubble on the eternal river of time; if there be really an immorUil part of him which need 'not |)erish ; and if his business on earth is to save it from per- ishing—he will still try to pierce the mountain barrier; he will still And the work as hard as Bunyan found it. We live in days of progress an.l enlightenment; nature on a hundred sides has unlocked her storehouses of knowl- edge. But she has furnished no " oi)en sesame " to bid the mountain gate fly wide which leads to conquest of self. There isstiJl no passiage there for " body and soul and sin.'' I J s [chap. I). M' it with all en for li'old," Had I liad incs over for ivortcd state. Christ: 'IIo ine to Jliin.' 5 to Christ, itids for now I the flower, roni licaven, fail realities^ ^clinical tlie- iiW chamber, )oor driido-cs ith spiritual is more than of time ; if ^h need not it from por- aiii barrier; II found it. ; nature on ^ of knowl- " to bid the U'st of self, ul and sin." CHAPTER III. " GRACE ABOUNDING." The women in Bedford, to whom Banyan had opened his mind, had been naturally interested in him. Young and rough as he was, he could not have failed to impress any- one wjio conversed with him witli a sense that lie was a remarkable person. They mentioned him to Mr. Gifford, tlie minister of the Bai)tist Churcli at Bedford. John winos of temptation, and the wind wunld bear mo away." " I blessed the doy; and toad, and counted the condition of everytliinu; that God hail made far bettor than this dreadful state of mine. The dotr or horse had no soul to perish under the everlasting- weight of hell for sin, as mine was like to do." Doubts about revelation and the truth of Scripture wore more easy to encounter then than they are at present. IJunyan was protected by want of learning, and by n powerful prodisj)osition to find the objection;* against the credibility of iIk; (iospol history to be groundless. (Crit- ical investigation luid not as yet analysed the historical construction of tli'.i sucrnd books; and scepticism, as he saw it in people round him, did actually come from the devil ; that is, from a desire to escape the moral restraints of re- ligion. The wisest, noblest, best instructed men in Eng- land at that time regarded the IJible as an authentic com- munication from (xod, and as the only foundation for law and civil society. The masculine sense and strong, mc-dest intellect of Jiunyan ensured his ac(]uiescence in an opin- ion so powerfully supported. Fits of uncertainty recur- red even to the end of his life; it must be so with men who arc honestly in earnest ; but his doubts were of course only intermittent, and his judgment was in the main sat- isfied that the Bible was, as he had boon taught, the Word of God. This, however, helped him little; for in the Bible he n ad his own condemnation. The weight which pressed him down was the sense of las unworthiness. What was he tliat God should care for him ? lie fancied [CIIAP. that. ]i(i was 'if to a cliilii lid," lio siiys, 11111(1 ill tlic V 1110 away." id condition ?r than this d no soul to sin, as mint! ripturc wore at present. ^, and by a i a^'ainst tlie dless. C'l'it- he historical ni, as he saw in the devil ; raints of ro- iicn in Eng- tlicntic com- tioii for law rono-, nicdcst ill an opin- ;aiiity recur- io with men :m'c of course le main sat- it, tlie Word for in the .eight wliich nworthiness. lie fancied ni.l "(;kack auouni)in(J." 41 that he licard CJod Kiying to the angels, " This poor, simple wrelcli doth hanker after me, as if I had nothing to do with my merey hut to iiestow it on su(;h as he. Poor fool, how art thou deceived! It is not for such as thee to jiave favour with tiie Iligliest." iMiserahle as he was, he clung to hi-i ijiisery as tlie ono link which connected him with the ohject of his longitigs. If he had no hojie of heaven, he was at least distracted that he must lose it. lh\ was afraid of dying, yet he was still morc! afraid of continuing to live; lest the impression should wear away through time, and occnipation and other interests siiould turn his heart away to the world, and thus his wounds might cease to pain him. Readers of the *' I'ilgrim's Progress" sometimes ask with woiiijer, why, after Christian had been received into the narrow gate, and had been set forward upon his way, so many trials and dangers still lay before him. The an- swer is simply that Christian was a pilgrim, that tli(^ jour- ney of life still lay before liim, and at every step temp- tations would meet him in new, unexpected sliapes. St. Anthony in his hermit.'ige was beset by as many fiends as Imd ever troubled hi.ii when in the world. Man's spirit- ual existence is like the flight of a bird in the air; he is .sustained only by effort, and when lir -eases to exert him- self he fall.9. There are intervals, hr /er, of comparative calm, and to one of these the storm-tossed Bunyan was now approachiii"- '[<; had passed through the Sloii li of Despond. iiad gone astray after Mr. Legality, and tho rocks h;i 'i .(I 44 BUN Y AX. [chap. eat my food, stoop for a pin, chop a stick, or cast my eye to look on this or that, but still the temptation would come, ' Sell Christ for this, sell ilim for that 1 Sell Ilim ! Sell Him !' " He had been haunted before with a notion that he was under a spell ; that he had been fated to commit the un- pardonable sin ; and he was now thinking of Judas, who had been admitted to Christ's intimacy, and had then betrayed him. Here it was before him — the very thing which he had so long dreaded. If his heart did but con- sent for a monent, the deed was done. His doom had overtaken him. He wrestled with the thought as it rose, thrust it from him " with his hands and elbows," body and mind convulsed together in a common agony. As fast as the destroyer said, "Sell Him," Bunyan said, "I will not; I will not; I will not; not for thousands, thousands, thou- sands of worlds !" One morning, as he lay in his bed, the voice came again, and would not be driven away. Banyan fought against it till he was out of breath. He fell back exhausted, and, without conscious action of his will, the fatal sentence passed through his brain, " Let Him go if He will." That the "selling Christ" was a bargain in which he was to lose all and receive nothing is evident from the form in which he was overcome. Yet, if he had gained a fortune by fraud or forgery, he could not have been more certain that he had destroyed himself. Satan had won the battle, and he, " as a bird shot from a tree, had fallen into guilt and despair." He got out of bed, "and went moping into the fields," where he wander- ed for two hours, " as a man bereft of life, and now past recovering," "bound over to eternal punishment." He shrank under the hedges, " in guilt and sorrow, bemoan- in.] "GRACE ABOUNDING." 46 lat he was it the iin- udas, who had tlieu ,'cry thing 1 but con- iooni liad as it rose, body and As fast as [ will not ; mds, tliou- is bed, the Banyan ■}, fell back 3 will, the lim go if which he , from the d gained a been more shot from got out of he wander- 1 now past cut." He w, bemoan- inf^ the hardness of his fate." In vain the words now came back that had so comforted him, "The blood of Christ clcanseth from all sin." They had no application to him. He had acquired his birthright, but, like Esau, he had sold it, and could not any more find place for re- pentance. True, it was said that "all manner of sins and blasphemies should be forgiven unto men," but only such sins and blasphemies as liad been committed in the natural slate. Bunyan had received grace, and, after receiving it, had sinned against the Holy Ghost. It was done, and nothing could undo it. David had received grace, and had committed murder and adultery after it. But murder and adultery, bad as they might be, were only transgressions of the law of Moses. Bunyan had sinned against the Mediator himself ; " he had sold his Saviour." One sin, and only one, there was which could not be pardoned, and he had been guilty of it. Peter had sinned against grace, and even after he had been warned. Tetor, however, had but denied his Master. Bunyan had sold him. He was no David or Peter, he was Judas. It was very hard. Others naturally as bad as he had been sa''"'l. Why had he been picked out to be made a Son ' .(.dition? A Judas! AVas there any point in which iiL, uas better than Judas? Judas luul sinned with delib- erate purpose : he " in a fearful hurry," and " against prayer and striving." But there might be more ways than one of committing the unpardonable sin, and there might be degrees of it. It was a dreadful condition. The old doubts came back. " I was now ashamed," he says, " that I should be like such an ugly man as Judas. I thought how loathsome I should be to all the saints at the Day of Judgment. I was tempted to content myself by receiving some false I f*i , < 46 BUNYAN. [chap. a opinion, as that tlicre sliould be no sncli thini^ as the Day of Jiulgnient, that we should not rise again, tliat sin was no such grievous thing, the tempter suggesting that if these things should be indeed true, yet to believe otherwise would yield nic ease for the present. If I must perish, I need not torment myself beforeliand." Judas! Judas! was now for ever before his eyes. So identified he was with Judas that he felt at times as if his breastbone was bursting. A mark like Cain's was on him. In vain he searehcd again through the catalogue of par- doned sinners. Manasseh had consulted wizards and fa- miliar spirits. Manasseh had burnt his children in the fire to devils. He had found mercy ; but, alas ! j\Ianasseh's sins had nothing of the nature of selling the Saviour. To have sold the Saviour " was a sin bigger than the sins of a country, of a kingdom, or of the whole world — not all of them together could equal it." His brain was ovei'strained, it will be said. Very likely. It is to be remembered, however, who and what he was, and that he had overstrained it in his eagerness to learn what he conceived his Maker to wish him to be — a form of anxiety not common in this world. The cure was as remarkable as the disorder. One day he was " in a good man's shop," still "afflicting himself with self-abhorrence," when something seemed to rush in throngh an open win- dow, and he heard a voice saying, "Didst ever refuse to be justified by the blood of Christ?" Bunyan shared the belief of his time. lie took the system of things as the Bible represented it; but his strong common sense put him on liis or'iard against !>eing easilv crednlous. lie thought at the time that the voice was supernatural. Af- ter twenty years he said, modestly, that he " could not make a judgment of it," The effect, any way, was as if an an- [chap, [is the Day sin was no at if these wise would ish, I need eyes. So cs as if his as on him. fue of par- •ds and fa- in the firo Manusseli's viour. To tlic sins of Id — not all ^ery likely, at he was, ss to learn )e — a form ure was as 'in a jTood :)horrencc," open win- r refuse to shared the in2;s as the sense put lions. He tural. Af- d not make IS if an an- .II.] GRACE ABOUNDING." 47 <>ol had come to him and had told him that there was still liope. Hapless as his condition was, he might still pray for mercy, and might possibly find it. He tried to pray, and found it very liard. The devil whispered again that (iod wa.-. tired of him ; God wanted to be rid of him and Ills importunities, and had, therefore, allowed him to com- mit this particular sin tliat he might hear no more of liim. He remembered Esau, and thought that this might be too true : *' the saying about Esau was a flaming sword barring the way of the tree of life to him." Still he would not give in. " I can but die," he said to himself ; " and if it must be so, it shall be said that such an one died at the feet of Christ in prayer." He was torturing himself with illusions. Most of the saints in the Catholic Calendar have done the same. The most remorseless pliilosopher can hardly refuse a certain aihiiiration for this poor uneducated village lad struggling so bravely in the theological spider's web. The " Profess- ors " could not comfort him, having never experienced similar distresses in their own persons. He consulted "an Aiitient Christian," telling him that he feared that he had sinned against the Holy Ghost. Tiie Antient Christian answered gravely that he thought so too. The devil hav- ing him at advantage, began to be witty with him. The devil suggested that, as he had offended the second or third Person of the Trinity, he had better pray the Father to mediate for him with Christ and the Holy Spirit. Then the devil took another turn. Christ, he said, was really sorry for Bunyan, but his case was beyond remedy. Bun- van's sin was so peculiar, that it was not of the nature of those for which He bad l)led and died, and had not, there- fore, been laid to His charge. To justify P)unyan he must come down and die again, and that was not to be thouijht 'I (1 w. 48 BUN VAN. [CUAP. -I of. "Oh!" exclaimed the unfortunate victim, "the un- thought-of imaginations, frights, fears, and terrors that arc effected by a thorough application of guilt (to a .spirit) that is yielded to desperation. This is the man that hath his dwelling among the tombs," Sitting in this humour on a settle in the street at Bed- ford, he was pondering over his fearful state. The sun in heaven seemed to grudge its light to him. " The stones in the street and the tiles on the houses did bend them- selves against him." Each crisis in Bunyan's mind is al- ways framed in the picture of some spot where it occurred. He was crying, " in the bitterness of liis soul, llow can God comfort such a wretch as 1 am ?" As before, in the shop, a voice came in answer, " This sin is not unto death." The first voice had brought him hope, which was almost extinguished ; the second was a message of life. The night was gone, and it was dajlight. lie had come to the end of the Valley of the Shadow of Death, and the spec- tres and the liobgoblins which had jibbered at him sud- denly all vanished. A moment before he had supposed that he was out of reach of pardon — that he had no right *;o pray, no right to repent, or, at least, that neither prayer nor repentance could profit him. If his sin was not to death, then he was on the same ground as other sinners. If they might pray, he might pray, and might look to be forgiven on the same terms, lie still saw that his " sell- ing Christ " had been " most barbarous," but despair was followed by ;ni extravagance, no less unbounded, of grati- tude, when 1 c\t that Christ would pardon even this. *' Love and affection for Christ," he says, " did work at tliis time such a strong and hot desire of rcvengement upon myself for the abuse I had done to Him, that, to sDcak as then I thought, had T had a thousand gallons of I. ; i UI.] " GKAt'E ABOUNDING." 40 blood in my veins, 1 could froely have spilt it all at the command of my Lord and Saviour. The tempter told me it was vain to pray. Yet, tliouo;ht I, I will pray. But, said the tempter, your sin is unpardonable. Well, said I, I will pray. It is no boot, said he. Yet, said I, l will pray ; so I went to prayer, and I uttered words to this c'lToct: Lord, Satan tells me that neither Thy mercy nor <'hrist's blood is sufficient to save my soul. Lord, shall I honour Thee most by believing that Thou wilt and canst, or bin), by l)elievino- that Thou neither wilt nor canst? Lord, 1 would fain honour Thee by believing that Thou wilt and canst. As I Avas there before the Lord, the Scripture came, Oh ! man, great is thy faith, even as if Olio had clapped mc on the back." The waves had not wholly subsided ; but wc need not follow the undulations any farther. It is enough that af- ter a " conviction of sin," considerably deeper than most people find neccs-iry for themselves, Banyan had come to realize what was meant by salvation in Christ, accord- ing to the received creed of the contemporary Protestant world. The intensity of his emotions arose only from the completeness with which he believed it. Man had sinned, and by sin was made a servant of the devil. His redemp- tion was a personal act of the Saviour towards each indi- vidual sinror. Jn the Atonement Christ had 'lefore him each separate person whom he designed to savv blotting out his offences, however heinous they might be, and re- cording in place of them his own perfect obedience. Each reconciled sinner in return regarded Christ's sufferings as undergone immediately for himself, and gratitude for that great deliverance enabled and obliged him to devote his strength and soul thenceforward to God's service. In the seventeenth century, all earnest English Protestants held 60 BUKYAN. H\ [chap. this belief. In the ninctcentli century, most of us repeat the plirases of this belief, and pretend to hold it. Wc think wc liold it. Wo are growing more cautious, per- haps, with our definitions. We suspect that there may be mysteries in God's nature and methods which we cannot fully explain. The outlines of "the scheme of salvation" are growing indistinct ; and we see it through a gatherino- mist. Yet the essence of it will remain true, whether we recognise it or not. While man remains man he will do things which he ought not to do. He will leave undone things which he ought to do. To will, may be present with liiin; but how to perform what lie wills, he will nev- er fully know, and he will still hate "the body of death" which he feels clinging to him. He will try to do better. When he falls, he will struggle to his feet again, lie will climb and climb on the hill-side, though he never reaches the top, and knows tli t he can never reach it. llis life will be a failure, which he will not dare to offer as a fit account of himself, or as worth a serious regard. Yet he will still hope that he will not be wholly cast away when, after his sleep in death, he wakes again. Now, says Bunyan, there remained only the hinder part of the tempest. Heavenly voices continued to encourage him. " As I was passing in the field," ho goes on, " I heard the sentence, thy righteousness is in heaven ; and methought I saw, with the eyes of my soul, Jesus Christ at God's right hand, there I say, as my righteousness, so that wherever I was, or whatever I was doing, God could not say of me lie wants my righteousness, for that was just before Ilim. Now did my chains fall off my legs in- deed. I was loosed from my aflSiction and irons; my temptations also fled away, so that from that time those dreadful Scriptures of God left off to trouble me. Now il ' 1 in,] GRACE ABOUNDING." 61 went I homo rejoiciiii; for the grace and love of God. Christ of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness, and sanctification and redemption, I now lived very sweetly at peace with God through Christ. Oh ! mc- lliought, Christ! Christ! There was nothing but Christ before my eyes. I was not now only looking upon this and the other benefits of Christ apart, as of J I is blood, burial, and resurrection, but considered Ilim as a wliole Christ. All those graces that were now green in me were yet but like .hose cracked groats and four{)ence half-pen- nies which rich men carry in their purses, while their gold is in their trunks at home. Oh ! I saw n»y gold was in my trunk at home in Christ my Lord and .Saviour. Tlie Lord led me into the mystery of union with the Son of (rod, that 1 was joined to Him, that I was tlesh of His flesh. If He and 1 were one. His righteousness was mine, His merits mine, His victory mine. Now T could see my- self in heaven and earth at once; in heaven by my Christ, though on earth by my body and person. Christ was that common and public person in whom the whole body of His elect arc always to be considered and reckoned. We fulfilled the law by Him, died by Him, rose from the dead by Him, got the victory over sin and death, the devil and hell by Him. I had cause to say, Praise ye the Lord. Traise God in His sanctuary." 3* l> f ^T CIlArTEU IV. CALL TO THE MINISTIIY. The Pilgriin falls into the li.ancls of Giant Despair because he has himself first strayed into Uyepath Meadow. Bun- yau found an e.\i)lanatiun of his last convulsion in an act of unbelief, on which, on lookinj^ back, he perceived that he had been guilty, lie had been delivered out of hie first teniptatidii. lie had not been suflieiently on his •i:uard apiinsi h mptations that might come in the future; nay, ho had himself tempted (b.d. His wife had been overtaken by a premature continement, and was suffering acutely. It was at the time when Biinyan was exercised with questions about the truth of religion altogether. As the poor woman lay crying at his side, ho liad said, mental- ly, " Lord, if Thou wilt now remove this sad affliction from my wife, and cause that she be troubled no more therewith this night, then T shall know that Thou canst discern the more secret thoughts of the heart." In a moment the pain ceased, and she fcdl into a sleep wliieh lasted till morn- ing. Bunyan, though surprised at the time, forgot what had happened, till it rushed back upon his memory, when he had committed himself by a similar mental assent to selling Christ. He remembered the proof which had been given to him that God could and did discern his thoughts. God had discerned this second thought also, and in pun- ishing him for it had punished him at the same time for n tlUP. IV.] CALL To THE MLMSTKV. 63 )air because linv. Bun- 1 ill an act ueived that out of his tly on his the future ; ■ had been IS suffcriuf^ s exorcised X'ther. As lid, mental- iction from 3 therewith discern tlio loiiiont tlie 1 till morn- >ri»;ot what nory, wlien 1 assent to li had been s thoughts, id in {)un- le time for the doubt whieli lie had allowed himself to feel. '"I should have believed His word," iio said, " and not have put an ' if uj)on the all-seeinj^ness of God." The suffering; was over now, and he felt that it had boon iiifinitoly beneficial to him. lie understood bettor the oJDry of Ood and of his Son. The Scriptures had opened their secrets to him, and ho had seen them to be in very truth the keys of the kingdom of Heaven. Never so clearly as after this "temptation" had lie perceived "the heights of grace, and love, and mercy." Two or three times "he had such strange apprehensions of the grace of (iod as had amazed him." The im[)ression was so over- powering that if it had continued long " it would have reiiilered him incapable for business." lie joined his friend Mr. Gilford's church. He was baptised in the Ouse, and became a professed member of the IJaptist congregation. Soon after, his mental conflict was entirely over, and ho had two quiet years of peace. "Before a man can use his powers to any purpose, he must arrive at some conviction in which his intellect can accjuicscc. "Calm yourself," says Joan Paul; "it is your first necessity. Be a stoic, if nothing else will serve." Bunyan had not been drivei. into stoicism. He was now restored to the possession of his faculties, ana his remarkable ability was not long in showing itself. The first consequence of his mental troubles was an ill- ness. He had a cough which threatened to turn into con- sumption. He thought it was all over \.ith him, and he was fixing his eyes " on the heavenly Je/usalom and the iiuiumerable company of angels;" but tlio danger passed off, and he became well and strong in mind and body. Notwithstanding his various miseries, he had not noglcct- od his business, and had, indeed, been specially successful. M 04 BUNYAN. fciIAI*. By the time that he was twcnty-tivu years old ho was in ii position consicU'i-ably supciior to that iti uhit-ii ho was horn. "God," says a contemporary hioirraplier, " had in- creased his stores »o tliat he lived in j^'reat credit amon;^- his neiirhhours." On May 13, 1053, liedfordshire sent an address to Cromwell approvitiij the dismissal of the Lon*^ I'Hrliament, reeo^iiisinj,' Oliver himself as the Lord's in- strument, and recommendini,' the county mauistrates as tit persons to serve in the Assembly which was to take its place. Among thirty-six names attacdied to this document appear those of Gilford and J'.nnyan. 1'liis speaks for itself: he must have been at least a householder and a ])cr- son of consideration. It was not, however, as a prosperous l)razier that Jiunyan was to make his way. lie had ;■ ijift of speech, which, in the democratic congreo-ation to whicli he bclonj^^ed, could not long remain hid. Young as he was, ho had sounded the depths of spiritual experience. Like Dante, he had been in hell— the popular hell of Eng- lish Puritanism— and in 1055, he \ is called ui)on to take ])art in the " ministry." lie was modest, humble, shrink- ing. The minister when he preached was, according to the theory, an instrutnent uttering the words not of him- self but of the Holy Spirit. A man like Bunyan, who really believed this, might well be alarmed. After earnest entreaty, however, "he made experiment of his powers" in private, and it was at once evident that, with the thing which these people meant by inspiration, he was abun- dantly supplied. No such preacher to the imcducated English masses was to be found within the four seas. He says that he had no desire of vainglory; no one who has studied liis character can suppose that he had. He was a man of nuairal genius, who believed the Protestant form of Christianity to be completely true. He knew nothing ir •vl CALL TO TlIK MIMSTUV. fi5 „f i-hilosopliy, »i«»liinii of liistory, notliing of literutnre, TIh- .lonbtH to whicli Ik- iu-kiiowlodi^'od Wmfj; without tli«ir iiiitiirul food. Iiml never pivsontcd tlK'mscK.s in h foiiii wliich would li.'ivo coinpi'lk-d liim to suitinit to rt'iniiiii mi- cfiluin. Doubt, as lie luid felt it, was a direct eiiciny of lunrality and purity, and as such he had foui^dit with it and .'omiuered it. Trotentant Christianity was true. All mankind were pt-rishinuj unless they saw it to he .rue. This was his mossau;e; a uiessaj^e — supposini,' him to have br-en rinht — of an importance so immeasurable that all else was nothing'. He was still " alHicted with th. tiery darts (.f the devil," but he saw that he must not bury his abili- ties. "In fear and tremblinji," tliercfore, lie set hinjself to the work, and " did according to his power preach the (Jospel that God had shewn liim." '"riie Lord led him to bei,nn where his Word betjan— with sinners. This pu- . '^' my work," he says, " I fulfilled with a great sense, f -r the loi-ors of the law and guilt for my transgressions 1j y hruvy o' my conscience. I preach- ed what I felt. I \\iA i»een -iit to my hearers as from the dead. 1 went my t in c'n.ans to preach to them in chains, and carried that tire in my own conscience that T persuaded them to beware of. I have gone full of guilt and terror to the pulpit door; God carried me on with a strong hand, for neither guilt nor hell could take me olf." ^hinv of r>un van's addresses remain in the form of the- ological treatises, and, that I may not. have to return to the subject, T shall give some account of them. His doctrine was the doctrine of the best and strongest minds in Eu- rope. It had been believed by Luther, it had been believed by Knox. It was believed at that moment by Oliver Cromwell as completely as by Bunyan himself. It was believed, so far as sucli a person could be said to believe wf 66 BUXYAN. [chap. ■'■{ anything, by the all-accomplished Leibnitz himself. Few educated people use the language of it now. In them it was a fire from heaven shining like a sun in a dark world. With us the fire has gone out ; in the place of it we have but smoke and ashes; and the Evangelical mind, in search of " something deeper and truer than satisfied the last cen- tury," is turning back to Catholic verities. What Bunyan liad to say may bo less than the whole truth : we shall scarcely find the still missing part of it in lines of thought wliich we have outgrown. Bunyan preached wherever opportunity served — in woods, in barns, on village greens, or in town chapels. The substance of his sermons ho revised and published. lie began, as he said, witli sinners, explaining the condi- tion of men in the world. They were under the law, or they were under grace. Every person that came into the world was born under the law, and as such was bound, under pain of eternal damnation, to fulfil completely and continually every one of the Ten Commandments. The Bible said plainly, " Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of tlie law to do them." " The soul that sinneth, it shall die." The Ten Commandments extended into many more, and to fail in a single one was as fatal as to break them all. A mail might go on for a long time, for sixty years perhaps, without falling. Bunyan does not mean that anyone really could do all this, but he assumes the possibility ; yet he says if the man slipped once before he died, he would eternally perish. The law does not refer to words and actions only, but to thoughts and feelings. It fol- lowed a man in his prayers, and detected a wandering thought. It allowed no repentance to those who lived and died under it. If it was asked whether God could [chap. ilf. Few 1 tliem it rk world. ; we have in search ! last cen- t Banyan wc shall f thought rvcd — in chapels, luhlished. he condi- ic law, or e into the IS bound, letely and nts. The iontinueth of the law ie." The re, and to m all. A s perhaps, at anyone lossibility ; e died, he • to words s. It fol- wandcring who lived Grod could .v.] CALL TO THE MLVISTRY. 61 not pardon, as earthly judges pardon criminals, the answer was that it is not the law which is merciful to the earthly offender, but the magistrate. The law is an eternal prin- ciple. The magistrate may forgive a man without exact- ing satisfaction. The law knows no forgiveness. It can be us little changed as an axiom of mathematics. Re- pentance cannot undo the past. Lot a man leave his sins and live as purely as an angel all the rest of his life, his old faults remain in the account against him, and his state is as bad as ever it was. God's justice once offended knows not pity or compassion, but runs on the offender like a lion and throws him into prison, there to lie to all eternity unless infinite satisfaction be given to it. And that satisfaction no son of Adam could possibly make. This conception of Divine justice, not as a sentence of a judge, but as the action of an eternal Ir ', is identical with Spinoza's. That every act involves consequences which cannot be separated from it, and may continue operative to eternity, is a philosophical position which is now tronerallv admitted. Combined wit' the traditionarv notions of a future judgment and punishment in hell, the recognition that there was a law in the case, and that the law could not be broken, led to the frightful inference that each individual was liable to be kept alive and tortured through all eternity. And this, in fact, was the fate really In store for every human creature unless some extraordi- nary remedy could be found. Bunyan would allow no merit to anyone. He would not have it supposed that only the profane or grossly wicked were in danger from the law. "A man " he says, "may be turned from a vain, loose, open, profane conversation and sinning against the law, to a holy, righteous, religious life, and yet be under the same state and as sure to be damned as the others !i i".' 68 BUNYAN. [chap. that arc more profane and loose." The natural man might think it strange, but the language of the curse was not to be mistaken. Cursed is every one who has failed to fulfil the whole law. There was not a. person in the whole world who had not himself siimed in early life. All had Binned in Adam also, and St. Paul had said in consequence, " ' There is none that doeth good, no, not one !' The law was given not that we might be saved by obeying it, but that we might know the holiness of God and our own. vileiicss, and that we might understand that we should not be damned for nothing, (iod would have no (piarrelling at His just condemning of us at that day." This is Ihuiyan's notion of the position in which we all naturally stand in this world, and from which the sub- stitution of Christ's perfect fulfilment of the law alune rescues us. It is calculated, no doubt, to impress on u.-, a profound horror of moral evil when the penalty attached to it is so fearful. But it is dangerous to introduce into religion metaphysical conceptions of "law." The cord cracks that is strained too tightly ; and it is only for brief periods of high spirit\ial tension that a theology so merci- less can sustain itself. No one with a conscience in him will think of claiming any merit for himself. But we know also that there are degrees of demerit, and, theory or no theory, we fall back on the first verse of the Eng- lish Liturgy, as containing a more endurable account of things. For this reason, among others, Bunyan disliked the Liturgy. He thought the doctrine of it false, and he ob- jected to a Liturgy on principle. He has a sermon on Traver, in which lie insists that to be worth anything prayer must be the expression of an inward feeling ; and that people cannot feel in lines laid d- n.u for tiieni. i (3 IV,] CALL TO THE MINISTRY. 59 Forms of prayer he thought especially mischievous to chil- dren, as accustoming them to use words to which they attached no meaning. '* My judgment," he says, " is that men go the wrong wav to luarn tiieir children to pray. It seems to me a hetter way for people to tell their children betimes what cursed creatures they are, how they arc under the wrath of G(kI by reason of original and actual sin ; also tu tell them the nature of God's wrath and the duration of misery, which, if they wonld conscientiously do, they would sooner learn their children to pray thaa they do. The way that men learn to pray is by conviction of sin, and this is the way to make our 'sweet babe?,' do so too." "Sweet babes" is unworthy of IJunyan. There is little sweetness in a state of things so stern as he conceives, lie might have considered, too, that there was a danger of inahing children nnroal in another and worse sense by teaeliing them doctrines which neither child nor man can .comprehend. It may be true that a single sin may con- sign me to everlasting hell, but I cannot be made to ac- knowledo-e the nisticc of it. "Wrath of God" and such expressions arc out of place wlien we are brought into the presence of metaphysical laws. Wrath corresponds to free-will misused. It is senseless and extravagant when l>ronounced against actions which men cannot help, when the faulty action is the necessary consequence of their nature, and the penalty the necessary consequence of the action. The same confusion of thought lies in the treatment of the kindred subjects of Free-will, F^lcction, and Reproba- tion. The logic must be maintained, and God's moral at- tributes simultaneously vindicated. Bunyan argues about m m % 60 BUNYAX. [chap. i If it as intjcniously as Leibnitz himself. Those who suppose tliat spceitie ;i-iiilt attaolies to particular acts, that all men are put into the world free to keep the Comniandnients or to break ihcni, that they are equally able to do one as to do the other, and are, therefore, i)roi)er objects of i)unisli- nient, hold an opinion which is consistent in itself, but is in entire contradiction with facts. Children are not as able to control their inclinations as grown men, and one man is not as able to control himself as another. Some have no difficulty from the first, and are constitutionally good ; some are constitutionally weak, or have incurable propensities for evil. Some arc brought up with care and insight ; others seem never to have any chance at all. So evident is this, that impartial thinkers have questioned the reality of hu- man guilt in the sense in which it is generally understood. Even Butler allows that if we look too curiously \\ c may liave a difficulty in finding where it lies. And here, if any- where, there is a veal natural truth in the doctrine of Elec- tion, indei)endent of the merit of those who are so happy as to find favor. Bunyan, however, reverses the inference. lie will have all guilty together, those who do well and those who do ill. Even the elect ar-- in themselves as bad- ly off as the reprobate, and arc equally included under sin. Those who arc saved are saved for Christ's uK'rits and not for their own. Men of calmer temperament accept facts as they find them. They arc too conscious of their ignorance to in- sist on explaining problems which arc beyond their reach. Bunyan lived in an age of intense religious excitement, when the strongest minds were exercising themselves on those questions. It is noticeable that the most effective intellects inclined to necessitarian conclusions; some in the shape of Calvinism, some in the corresponding philosophic COLLEGE UNIVERSITAIRE SHERBROOKE iv.l CALL TO THE MINISTRY. 61 form of Spinozism. From botli alike tlicrc came an abso- lute submission to the decrees of God, and a passionate devotion to liis service ; wliile the morality of Free-will is cold and calcnlatini;". Appeals to a sense of duty do not reach beyond the iiiiderstandino". The enthusiasm Avhich will stir men's hearts and give them a real power of resisting temptation mast bo nourished on more invigorating food. But I need dwell no more on a subject which is nnsuited for these pages. The object of Banyan, like that of Luther, like that of all great spiritual teachers, was to bring his wandering fel- low-mortals into obedience to the commandments, even while he insisted on the worthlessncss of it. lie sounded the strings to others which had sounded loudest in him- self. "When he passed from mysticism into matters of or- dinary life, he showed the same practical good sense which distinguishes the chief of all this order of thinkers — St. I'au!. There is a sermon of Banyan's on Christian be- haviour, on the duties of parents to children, and masters to servants, which might be studied with as nnich advan- tage in English households as The Pilgrwi's Prorp-css- it- scH'. To fathers lie says, "Take heed that the misdeeds for which thou corrcctest thy children be not learned them by thee. Many children learn that wickedness of their parents, for which they beat and chastise them. Take heed that thou smile not upon them to encourage them in small faults, lest that thy carriage to them be an encour- agement to them to commit greater faults. Take heed that thou use not unsavoury and unseemly words in thy chastising of them, as railing, miscalling, and the like — this is devilish. Take heed that thou do not use them to many chiding words .nd threatonings, mixed with lightness and laughter. This will harden." % <>— ••' C2 BUNYAX. [chap. i And again : " 1 tell you that if parents carry it l.vingly towards their children, niixiiiii; their mercies uiili loving rebukes, and tlicir loving rebukes with fatherly and moth- erly conipiu^sions, they arc more likely to save their chil- dren than uy being churlish and severe to them. Even if these things do not save them, if their mercy do them no good, yet it will greatly case them at the day of death to consider, I liavc done by love as much a^ I could ;o save and deliver my child from hell." Whole volumes on education have -a\d less, or less to the purpose, than these siiiiplc words. Ui fortunately, TpiP onts do not read Bunyan. lie is left to children. Similarly, he says to imasters: — " It is thv duty so to bciiave thyself to thy servant that thv service nniy not only be for thy goud, but for the ji-o'od of thy sevant, and ihat in body and soul. Deal with him as to admonition as with tiiy diildivn. Take heed tliou do not turn thy servants into ..laves by over- charging tb.;m in thy work with thy greediness. Take heed tliou carry not thyself to thy servant as he of whom {*, is saiv'l, " He is such a man of P.elial that liis servants cannot speak to him." The Apostle bids you forbear to threaten them, because you also hav. a Master in Heaven. iSIasters, give your servants that whl 'h is just, just labour and just wages. Servants that are truly godly care not how cheap they serve their masters, provided they may get into godly families, or where they may be convenient for the Word. But if a master or mistress takes this op- portunity to make a prey of their servants, it is abominable. I have heard poor servants say that in some carnal families they have had more liberty to God's things and more fair- ness of dealing than among many professors. Such masters make reliijion to stink before the inhabitants of the land." .v.] CALL TO THE MLMSTRY. 63 Biinyan was generally cliarifablc in his judgment upon otluTs. If there was any exception, it was of professors who discredited their calling by conceit and worldlincss. " No sin," he says, " reignoth more in the world than piide among professors. The thing is too apparent for any man to deny. We may and do sec pride display it- self in the apparel and cai-riage of professors almost as much as among any in the land. I liave seen church mem- bers so decked and bedaubed with their fangles and toys that, when they have been at worsliip, I have wondered with what faces such painted persons could sit in the place where they were without swooning. I once talked with a maid, by way of reproof for her fond and gaudy garment ; she told me the tailor would make it so. Poor proud gjrl, she gave orders to the tailor to make it so." I will give one more extract from Bunyan's pastoral ad- dresses. It belongs to a later period in his ministry, when the law had, for a time, remade Dissent into a crime ; but it will throw light on the part of liis story which we arc now approaching, and it is in every way very characteris- tic of him. lie is speaking to sufferers under persecution, lie says to them : — "Take heed of being offended with magistrates, because by their statutes they may cross thy inclinations. It is given to them to bear the sword, and a command is to thee, if thy heart cannot acquiesce with all things, with meekness and patience to suffer. Discontent in the mind some- times puts discontent into the mouth ; and discontent in the mouth doth sometimes also put a lialtcr about thy neck. For as a man speaking a word in jest may for that bo hanged in earnest, so he that speaks in discontent may die for it in sober sadness. Above all, get thy conscience possessed more and more with this, that the magistrate is ij ) ' 64 BUXYAN. [chap. IV. God's ordinance, and is ordered of God as such ; that he is the minister of God to tlieo for good, and that it is thy (hity to fear liiin and to pray for him ; to give thanks to God for liiip and be subject to liim ; as both Paul and Peter admonish ns; and that not only for wratii, but for conscience' sake. For all other arguments come short of binding the soul when this argument is wanting, until avc believe that of God we arc bound thereto. " I speak not these things as knowing any that arc dis- affected to the government, for I love to be alone, if not with godly men, in things that are convenient. I speak to show uiy loyalty to the king, and my love to my fel- low-subjects, and my desire that all Christians shall walk in ways of peace and truth." fs 1 ,7. *.- -tfc'-'^J.^ '-„ m^m »m^a!tCMrJtr,iiX!<' Baptists, would have been a manja/ine of explosives. Under the rJoth of Elizabeth, Nonconformists refusing to attend worship in the parish churches were to be im- [)risoiH'(l till they made their submission. Three months were allowed them to consider. If at the end of that time they were still obstinate, tliey were to be banislied tiie realm; and if tiiey subsequently returned to England without permission from the Crown, they were liable to execution as felons. This Act had fallen with the Lono- lai lament, but at the Restoration it was h -Id to have re- vi -md to bo still in force. Tlic parish churches were ileaiva ■ ' +]ieir unordained ministers. The Dissenters' chapels were closed. The people were required by proc- ianmtion to be present on Sundays in their proper place. ! ' 68 niNVAX. [chap. So tlic mnjority of tlio nation had decided. If they had wished for relinJouH liberty they would not have restored the Stuarts, or tlicy would iiavo insisted on condiiions, and would have seen that they were observed. Venner's plot showed the reality of the dani;er and JUH- tificfl the preeaution. The IJaptists and Quakers n»iij;ht have been trusted to diseourai;u violence, but it was impossible to distin'ilant. liunyan was the most prominent Dissenter in the neiu'hbourhood. lie was too sensible to ctuirt martyr- dom. He had intended to leave the town till more quiet times, and had arrano-ed to meet a few of his peofjlc once more to c;ivc them a partina; address. It was November 12, IGOO. The place ajjreed on was a house in the village of Samsell, near Ilarlinolon. Notice of his intention was pri\ately conveyed to Mr. Wintifate, a magistrate in the adjoining district. The constables were set to watch the house, and were directed to bring Bunyau before him. s I v.] AF{[{F:ST AM) TItl.VL 09 Sotno member of the coiitficijation heard of it. Run van was waniod, and was advisod to stay at home that iiiylit, or else to conceal hiiiis* If. Ilin lU-parture had boon ahrady aiTani,'ed ; hut wlicn he Iciirnt that a warrant was actually out a«,'ainst him, ho thought that he was bound to stay and face the dauijfor. lie was the first Nonconformist who had been n)arked for arrest. If he tiinched after hi' had been Kindled out by name, the wholu body of his eon- ,1,'n'iration would be diseourai^ed. (jIo to church he would not, or |)r(tmiso to ijo to church; but he was willini; to suffer whatever punishment the law niiulit order. Thus, at the time and jtlaee wliirh had liocn aL';re(!d on, lie was in the room at Samsell, with hia Bible in his hand, and was about to bccfin his address, when tl*e constables enter- ed and arrested him. lie made no resistance, ile desired only to be allowed to say a few words, which the eon- .stables permitted, lie then prepared to go with them. Jle was nt)t treated with any roughness. It wjis too late to take him that nio;ht before the magistrate. His friends undertook for his appearance when be should be rcfjuired, and he went home with them. The constables came for him again on the following afternoon. Mr. Wingate, when the inforniation was first brought to him, supposed that lie liad fallen on a nest of Fifth Mon- archy men. lie enquired, wlu^n Banyan was brought in, how many arms liad been found at the meeting. When he learnt that there were no arms, and that it had no po- litical character whatever, he evidently thouL,:.t it was a matter of no conserjucnce. lie told Bunyan that he had been breaking the law, and asked him why ho could not attend to his business. Bunyan said that his object in teaching was merely to persuade people to give up their sins, lie could do that and attend to his business also. > S :l i •■- ■ -M-i 70 BUN Y AX. [chap. v.] . .1 Winujatc answered tliat tl»c law niii'^t be obeyed, llo must coinmit IJunyau for trial at the Quarter Sessions; but lie would take bail for hiui, if his securities would cn- o-a^je that ho would not preach ai>;aiii njeaiiwhilc JJuuyan refused to be bailed on any such term.'-. Preach he would and must, and the recognizances would be forfeited. Af- ter such an answer, Wini>atc could only send him to t^aol ; lie could not help himself. The committal was made out, and Bunyan was beiuj^ taken away, when two of his friends nu't him, who were acquainted with ^\ in gate, and they begged the constable to wait. They went in to the magistrate. They told him who and what Dunyan was. The magistrate had not the lease desire to be hard, and it was agreed that if he would himself give suuie general promise of a vague kind he might be let go altogether. Bunyan was called back. Another magistrate who knew him had by this time joined AViugate. They both said that they were reluctant to send him to prison. If he would promise them that he would not call the })eople to- gether any more, he might go home. They had purposely chosen a form of words which would mean as little as possible. But Bunyan would not accept an evasion. lie said that he would not force the people to come together, but if he was ii» a plac;) where the people were met, he should certainly speak to them. The magistrate repeated that the meetings were unlawful. They woidd be satisfied if Bunyan would simply promise that he would not call such meetings. It was as plain as possible that they wished to dismiss the case, and they were thrusting words into his mouth which he could use without a mental reservation; but lie persisted that there were many ways in which a jueeting might bo called; if people came together to hear him, knowing that, v.] ARREST AND TRIAL. 71 he would speak, he might be said to liave called them to- gether. Remonstrances and entreaties were equally useless, and, with extreme unwillingness, they committed him to Bed- ford gaol to wait for the sessions. It is not for us to say that Bunyan was too precise. Ih' was himself the best judge of what his conscience and his situation required. To himself, at any rate, his trial was at the moment most severe. He had been left a wid- ower a year or two before, with four young children, one of thein blind. lie had lately married a second time. His wife was jiregnant. The agitation at her Imsband's arrest brought on premature labour, and she was lying in his house in great danger. He was an aflFcctionate man, and the separation at such a time was peculiarly distress- ing. After some weeks the Quarter Sessions came on. Bunyan was indicted under the usual form, that he, " be- ing a person of such and such condition, had, since such a time, devilishly and pertinaciously abstained from coming to churcli to hear Divine service, and was a common wp- holder rf unlawful meetings and conventicles, to the great disturbance and distraction of the good subjects of this kingdom, contrary to the laws of our Sovereign Lord the King." There seems to have been a wish tv avoid giving liim a formal trial. He was not required to plead, and it may have been thought that he had been punished sufticient- ly. He was asked why he did not go to church? He said that the I'rayer-book was made by man ; he v.as ordered in the Bible to pray with the spirit and the understanding, not with the spirit and the Prayer-book. The magistrates, referring to another Act of Parliament, cautioned Bunyan against finding fault with the Prayer-book, or he would I 'I I, ■t 72 BUNYAN. [chap. brinu; hiinsclf into further trouble. Justice Keelin, wlio pre- sided, said (so JJunyaii declares, and it lias been the stand- ing jest of his biographers ever since) that the Prayer-book had been in use ever since the Apostles' time. I\M'haps the words were that parts of it had been then in use (the Apostles' Creed, for instance), and thus they would liavo been strietlv true. However this might be, thev told him kindly, as Mr. Wingate had done, that it would be better for him if he would keep to his proper work. The law had prohibited conventicles. He might teach, if he pleased, in his own family and among his friends. He must not call large numbers of people together, lie was as imprac- ticable as before, and the magistrates, being but unregen- eratc mortals, may be pardoned if they found him provok- ing. If, he said, it was lawful for Jiim to do good to a few, it must be equally lawful to do good to manv. He had a gift, which he was bound to use. If it was sinful for men to meet together to exhort one another to follow Christ, lie should sin still. He was compelling the Court to punish him, whether thoy wished it or not. He describes the scene as if the choice had rested with the magistrates to convict him or to let him go. If he was bound to do his duty, they were e(iually bound to do theirs. Tin y took his answers as a plea of guilty to the indictment, and Justice Keelin, who was chairman, pronounced his sentence in the terms of the Act. He was to go to prison for three nionths; if, at the end of three months, he sti'l refused to conform, lie was to be transported; and if ho came back without li- cense he would be hanged. Runyan merely answered, " If I were out of prison to-day, I would preach the Gospel again to-morrow." More might have followed, but the gaoler led him away." [cHAr. , who pre- lie .stand- vver-book Perhaps 1 use (the )iil(l liavo told him be better The law e pleased, in list not s iiuprac- unregen- 1 provok- ood to a iny. JIc (•as sinful to follow , whether as if the •t him or Lity, they i answers e Keelin, he terms •iitlis; if, il'orm, lie itliout li- ered, " If c Gospel , but the v.] ARREST AND TRIAL. ia There wore three gaols in J>cdford, and no evidence has been found to show in which of the three Bunyan was confined. Two of them, the county gaol and the town gaol, were huge, roomy buildings. Tradition lias chosen the third, a small lock-i:p, fourteen feet square, which stood over the river between the central arches of the old bridge ; and as it appears from the story that he liad at times tU'ty or sixty fellow-prisoners, and as he admits himself that he was treated at first with exceptional kindness, it may be inferred that tradition, in selecting the prison on the bridge, was merely desiring to exhibit the sufferings of the Non- conformist martyr in a sensational form, and that he was never in this prison at all. When it was pulled down in 1811, a gold ring was found in the rubbish, witii the initials "J. B." upon it. This is one of the " trilles light as air" which carry conviction to the " jealous " only, and is too slight a foundation on which to assert a fact so inherently improbable. When the tliree months were over, the course of law would have brought him again to the bar, when he would have had to choose between conformity and exile. Tiiere was still the same de.sire to avoid extremities, and as the day approacl'cd, the clerk of the peace was sent to per- suade him into some kind of compliance. Various insur- rections liad broken out since his arrest, and must hav shown him, if he could have reflected, that there was real reason for the temporary enforcement of the Act, lie was not asked to give up preaching. He was asked only to give up public preaching. It was well known that he had no disposition to rebellion. Even the going to church was not insisted on. The clerk of the pence told him that he might "exhort his neighbours in private diseourse,'' if only he would not bring the people together in numbers, & 74 nUXYAN. [CIIAI*. which tlic magistrates would bo bound to notice. In this way he iniglit continue his usefuhicss, and would not be interfered with. Bunvan knew his own freedom from seditions inten- tions, lie would not see that the magistrates could not suspend the law and make an exception in his favour. They were going already to the utmost limit of indul- gence, I3ut the more lie disapproved of rebellion, the more punctilious he was in carrying out resistance of an- other kind which he held to be legitimate. lie was a representative person, and he thought that in yielding he Would hurt the cause of religious liberty. "The law," he said, '* had provided two ways of obeying — one to obey actively, and if he could not in conscience ob-'v actively, tlien to suffer whatever penalty was inflicted on him." The clerk of the peace could produce no effect. Bun> yan rather looked on liint as a false friend trying to en- tangle him. The three months elapsed, and the magis- trates had to detennine what Avas to be done. If liunyan was brought before them, they must exile him. His case was passed over and he was left in prison, wIri-c his wife and children were allowed to visit him daily. He did not understand the law or appreciate their forbearance. He exao-rjeratcd his danger. At tlie worst he could only liave been sent to America, where he might have remained as long as he pleased. He feared that he might perhaps be hanged. " I saw what was coming," he said, "and had two consid- erations especially on my heart — how to be able to endure, diouid my imprisonment be long and tedious, and liow to be able to encounter death should that be my portion. I was made to see that if I would suffer rightly, 1 must pass sentence of death upon everything that can properly be [CIIAI*. v.] ARREST AND TRIAL. 76 called a thing of this lifq, even to reckon myself, my wife, my children, my health, my enjoyments all as dead to me, and myself as dead to them. Yet I was a man compass- ed with infirmities. The partin-jc with my wife and poor children hath often been to mc in this place (the prison in which he was writing) as the pnlling of my flesh from my bones ; and that not only because I am too, too fond of those great mercies, but also because f should have often brought to my mind the hardships, miseries, and wants my poor family was like to meet with should 1 be taken froin them, especially my poor blind child, who lay nearer my heart than all I had besides. l»oor child, thought I, what sorrow art thou like to have for thy portion in this world! Thou must be beaten, suffer hunger, cohl, nakedness, and a thousand calamities, though I cannot now endure the wind should blow on thee. But yet, thought I, I must venture all with God, though it goeth to the quick to leave you. I was as a man who was pulling down his house upon the head of his wife and childion. Yot, thought I, I must do it— I must do it. I had this for consideration, that if I should now venture all for (iod, I engaged God to take care of my concernments. Also, I had dread of the tor- ments of hell, which I was sure they must partake of that for fear of the cross do shrink from their profession. I had this much upon my spirit, that my imprisonment might end in the gallows for aught I could tell. In the condition I now was u\ I was not fit to die, nor indeed did I think I could if I should be called to it. 1 feared I might show a weak heart, and give occasion to the enemy. This lay with great trouble on me, for methought 1 was ashamed to die with a pale face and tottering knees for such a cause as this. The things of God were kept out of my sight. The tempter followed me with, 'But whither F 4* 6 ?6 BUN Y AX. [chap, v. I must you go wlien you die? Wliat will become of you? What evidence liavc you for heaven and glory, and an in- heritaiu'c among them that arc sanctiiied?' Tims was I tossed many weeks ; but I felt it was for the Word and way of (»()d that I was in this condition, (iod might give nic comfort or not as lie pleased. I was bound, but He was free — yea, it was my duty to stand to His AN'ord, wlu-'ther He would ever look upon me or no, or sa\ c me at the last. Wherefore, thought I, the point being thus, I am f(jr going on and venturing niv eternal state witli Cln-ist, whether I have comfort here or no. If Oud does not come in, thouglit I, I will leap off the ladder even blind- fold into eternity, sink or swim, come heaven, come hell. Xow was my heart full of comfort.' The ladder Avas an imaginary ladder, but the resohition was a genuine manly one, such as lies at the bottom of all brave and lionourable action. Others who have Ihought very differently from Biinyan about such matters have felt the same as he felt, lie true to yourself, whau'ver comes, even if daniuation come. Hetter hell with an honest heart, than heaven with cowardice and insincerity. It was the mure civditable to liunyaii, too, because the spectres and liobc^bliiis had begun occasionally to revisit him. "Of all temptations I ever met with in my life," he says, *' to question the being of God and the truth of His (ros- pcl is the worst, anunyan legally convicted or not ? He had not pleaded directly to the indictment. No evidence had been heard against him. Ilis truil had l)een a conversa- tion between liimself and the Court. The point had been raised by his friends. His wife had been in London to make interest for liim, and a peer had presented a petition in ]iunyan\ t^-ha'f in the House of Lords. The judges had been direcNJ to look again into the matter at the midsun.imer assizes. The I'igh-sheriff was active in Bun- van's favour. The Judges Twisd. .1, Chester, and no less a person than Sir Matthew HaV , appear to have concluded that Ids conviction was legal, th u iic could not bo tried again, and that he must apply o\ pardon in the regular way. His wife, however, at the instance of the sheriff, m I I I- :\ 18 BUNrAN. [chap. If obtained a hearing, and they listened courteously to what she had to say. When she had done, Mr. Justice Twisden put the natural question, whether, if her husband was re- leased, he would refrain from preaching in public for the future. If he intended to repeat his offence immediately that he was at liberty, his liberty would only bring him into a worse position. The wife at once said that he dared not leave off preaching as long as he could speak. The judge asked if she thought her husband was to be allowed to do as he pleased. She said that he was a peaceable person, and wished only to be restored to a position in Avhich he could maintain his family. They had four small children who could not help themselves, one of them being blind, and they had nothing to live upon as long as her husband was in prison but the charity of their friends. Hale remarked that she looked very young to have four children. " I am but mother-in-law to them," she said, "having not been married yet full two years. I was with child when my husband was first apprehended, but being young, I being dismayed at the news fell in labour, and so continued for eight days. I was delivered, but my child died." Hale was markedly kind. He told her that, as the con- viction had been recorded, they could not set it aside. She might sue out a pardon if she pleased, or she might obtain " a writ of error," which would be simple and less expensive. She left the court in tears — tears, however, which were not altogether tears of suffering innocence. " It was not so much," she said, " because they vere so hardhearted against me and my husband, but to think what a sad ac- count such poor creatures would have to give at the com- ing of the Lord." No doubt both Bunvan and she TI.] THE BEDFORD GAOL. 79 tlioiiii;lit tlicinsclvcs cruelly injured, and they confounded the law with the adtninistration of it. Persons better in- formed than they often choose to forget that jud«;es are sworn to adniinistcr the law which they find, and rail at them as if the sentences wliich they are obliged by their oaths to pass were their own personal acts. A pardon, it cannot be too often said, would have been of no use to Bunyan, because he was determined to per- severe in disobcyii. ■ a law wliich lie considered to be un- just. The most real kindness which could be shown to him was to leave him where he was. His imprisonment was intended to be little more than nominal, ills gaoler, not certainly without the sanction of the sheriff, lot him go where he pleased ; once even so far as London, lie used his liberty as he had declared that he would. "I followed my wonted course of preaching," he says, " tak- ing all occasions that were put in my hand to visit the people of God." This was deliberate defiance. The au- thorities saw that he must be either punished in earnest, or the law would fall into contempt, lie admitted that he expected to bo "roundly dealt with." llis indulgences were withdrawn, and he was put into close confinement. Sessions now followed sessions, and assizes, assizes. His detention was doubtless irregular, for by law he should have been sent beyond the seas. He petitioned to be brought to trial again, and complained loudly that his petition was not listened to ; but no legislator, in framing an Act of Parliament, ever contemplated an offender in so singular a position, Bunyan was simply trying liis strength against the Crown and Parliament. The judges and magistrates respected his cliaracter, and were unwill- ing to drive him out of the country ; he had himself no wish for liberty on that condition. The only resource, :ll i^.iUii 80 nUXYAX. [(HAP. thcrofoiT, was to prevent him forcibly from ro[tojvtitii? an off(>nc;c that would compel tiieni to adopt liarsh moaHures which tliey wcro so earnestly trying to avoid. Such wa^ the world-famous imprist.finient of John IJnn- yan, which has heen the subject of so much ehnjuent dec- 'amatioti. It lasted in all fm- more than twelve years. It might liav(> ent'inl»Ics or approa. 'us the truth, I can but ay tliat to have thus abandoned int their most dist is^uishi"' t>astor and his f'/iniil; iHtcnselv dixTcditabio to tiiu i ipti'^t coniniiuiit V. E iish prisons in tho St , enteenth century were not models of goo'l man- aiicniont. IJut prisoners, whoso friends could pay for them, were not consigned to damp and dreary ceils; and in default of evidence of which not a particle exists, T can- not charge so reputable a community with a neglect so -(^andalous. The entire story is in iiH.'lf incredible. Bun- yan was prosperous in his business. Ik- was respected and looked up to by a large and gro\ .ody of citizens, including persons of wealth and posi' i London. He was a rcpicsentative sulTeror fighting battle of all the Nonconformists in England. Jle haii active supporters in the town of Bedford and among the gentlemen of the county. The authorities, so far as can be inferred from thei, Htions, tried from the first to deal as gently with him a- he would allow them to do. Is it conceivable that tho Baptists would have left his family to starve ; or that his own confinement would have been made so absurdly and needlessly cruel? Is it not far more likely that he found all the indulgences which money could buy and the rules of the prison would allow? Bnnyan is not himself responsible for these wild legends. Their "-A character appears more clearly when we obscve how be was oc- cupied during these years. Friends, in the first place, had free access to him, and strangers who were drawn to him by reputation; while the gaol was considered a private place, and he was al- MICROCOPY RESOLUTION TEST CHART (ANSI and ISO TEST CHART No. 2) 1.0 I.I 1.25 1^ m I 2.8 m 113.6 14.0 1.4 III 2.5 I 2.2 2.0 1.8 1.6 A APPLIED IIVHGE Inc 1653 East Moin Street Roctiester, New York U609 (716) 482 - 0300 - Ptione (716) 288 - 5989 - Fax USA .¥• ' i 82 BUNYAN. [chap. i ■ ' i lowed to prcacli there, at least occasionally, to his fellow- prisoners. Charles Doe, a distinguished Nonconformist, visited him in his confinement, and has left an account of what he saw. " When I was there," he writes, " there were about sixty dissenters besides himself, taken but f little before at a religious meeting at Kaistor, in the county of Bedford, besides two eminent dissenting ministers, Mr. AVheeler and Mr. Dun, by which means the prison was much crowded. Yet, in the midst of all that liurrv, I heard Mr. Bunyan both preach and pray with that mighty spirit of faith and plcrophory of Divine assistance, that ho made me stand and wonder. Here they could sin" without fear of being overheard, no informers prowling round, and the world shut out." This was not all. A fresh and more severe Conventicle Act was passed in 1G70. Attempts were made to levy tines in the town of Bedford. There was a riot there. Tho local officers refused to assist in quelling it. The shops were shut. Bedford was occupied by soldiers. Yet, at this very time, Bunyan was again allowed to go abroad through general connivance. He spent his nights with his family. He even preached now and then in the woods. Once, when he had intended to be out for the night, information was given to a clerical magistrate in the neighbourhood, who disliked him, and a constable was sent to ascertain if the prisoners were all within ward. Bunyan had received a hint of what was coming. He was in his place when the constable came ; and the gov- ernor of the gaol is reported to have said to him, " You may go out when you please, for you know better when to return than I can tell you." Parliament might pass laws, but the execution of them depended on the loca] authorities. Before the Declaration c' Indulgence, the Ml: [chap. V,.] THE BEDFORD GAOL. 83 Baptist clmrch in Bedford was reopenod. Bunyan, while still nominally in confinement, attended its mectinijs. In 1671 he became an Elder; in December of that year he was chosen Pastor. The (incstion was raised wliether, as a prisoner, he was eligible. The objection would not have been set aside had he been nnable to undertake the duties of the ofHoe. These facts prove conclusively that, for a part at least of the twelve years, the imprisonment was little more than formal, lie could not have been in the Bridge gaol when he had sixty fellow-prisoners, and was able to preach to them in private. It is unlikely that at any time lie was made to suffer any greater hardships than were absolutely inevitable. But whether Bunyan's confinement was severe or cas\, it was otherwise of inestimable value to him. It gave him leisure to read and reflect. Though he preached often, yet there must have been intervals, perhaps long in- tervals, of c()mi)uIsory silence. The excitement of per- petual speech-making is fatal to the exercise of the higher qualities. The periods of calm enabled him to discover powers in himself of which he might otherwise have never known the existence. Of books he had but few; for a time only the Bible and Foxe's Afartyrs. But the Bible thoroughly known is a literature of itself — the rarest and richest in all departments of thouglit or imagination which exists. Foxe's Mart>/rs, if he had a complete edition of it, would have given him a very ade(iuate knowledge o' history. With those two books he had no cause to com- plain of intellectual destitution. lie must have read more, however. lie knew George Herbert — {)erhaps Spenser — perhaps Paradise Lost. But of books, except of the Bible, lie was at no time a great student. Happily for himself, he had no other book of Divinity, and he needed none. l! ! n n I> ■'^i ii il I I f 84 BUNYAN. tCIlAP. Ills real stiuly was liuinan life as he had seen it, and the liiiman heart as he liad experienced the workings of it. Thoun-h he never mastered successfully the art of verse, he had other o-ifts which l)i;lon<^ to a true poet, lie had ini- a2;iuati()ii, if not of the hi^'hest, yet of a vcy hit;h order. lie had iuliuite inventive Ir.iinoar, tenderness, and, better than all, powerful masculine sense. To obtain the use of these faculties he needed only composure, and this Ins im- prisonment secured for him. He had ])ublished several theoloo'ical compositions before iiis arrest, which have rela- tively little value. Those which he wrote in prison — even on theological subjects — would alone have made him a rep- utation as a Nonconformist divine. In no other writiui^s are the peculiar views of Evangelical Calvinism brought out more clearlv, or with a inore heartfelt conviction of their truth. They liave furnished an arsenal from which English I'rotestant divines have ever since e(|uip{)ed them- selves. The most beautiful of them, Grace Ahou.idhirf to the Chief of Sinners, m his own spiritual biography, which contains the account of his early history. The firnt part of The Pil(irim''s Progi'ess was composed there as an amusement. To this, and to his ether works which belong to literature, I shall return in a future chapter. Visitors who saw liim in the gaol fount his manner and presence as impressive as his writings. '' lie was mild and affable in conversation," says one of them, " not given to loquacity or to much discourse, unless some urgent oc- casion required. It was observed he never spoke of him- self or of his talents, but seemed low in his own eyes. He was never heard to reproach or revile any, whatever injury he received, but rather rebuked those who did so. He managed all things with snf' actncss as if he had made it his study not to give oli ." [ciiap. VI.] THE BEDFORD GAOL. The final Declaration of Indulf/cnce came at last, brino-- ino- with it the privileo-c for which Bur van had fought and suffered. Charles II. cared as little for liberty as his father or his brother, but ho wished to set free the Cath- olics, and as a stop towards it he conceded a general tol- eration to the Protestant Dissenters, Within two years of the passing of the Conventicle Act of IGTO, this and every other penal law against Nonconformists was sus- pended. They were allowed to open their "meeting- houses " for " worship and devotion," subject only to a few easy conditions. The localities were to be specified i;i which chapels were required, and the ministers were to receive their licenses from the Crown, To prevent suspi- cions, the Roman Catholics were for the present excluded from the benefit of the concession. Mass could be said, as before, only in private houses. A year later, the Proc- Idmation was confirmed by Act of Parliament, Thus Bunyan's long imprisonment was ended. The cause was won, lie had been its foremost representative and champion, and was one of the first persons to receive the benefit of the change of poiioy. He was now forty- four years old. The order for his re!-ase was signed on May 8, 1C72, His license as pastor of Uie Baptist chapel at Bedford was issued on the 9th. lie established himself in a small house in the town, " When he came abroad," says one, "he found his tomr-oral affairs were gone to wreck, and he had, as to them, to begin again as if he had newly come into the world. But yet he was not destitute of friends who had all along supported him with neces- saries, and l.id been very good to his family ; so that by their assistance, getting things a little about him again, ho resolved, as much as possible, to decline worldly business, and give himself wholly up to the service of God." As Ji,1 I 'I ■ jiiij R i\ 1 86 BUNYAN. [chap. .It mucli as possible; but not entirely. In 1685, being afraid of a return of persecution, lie made over, as a precaution, his whole estate to his wife: "All and singular his goods, chattels, debts, rcndy money, plate, rings, household stuff, apparel, utensils, brass, pewter, bedding, and all his other substance." In this deed he still describes himself as a brazier. The laniiuage is that of a man in easy, if not ample, circumstances. "Though, by reason of losses which he sustained by imprisonment," says another biographer, "his treasures swelled not to excess, he always had suffi- cient to live decently and creditably." His writings and his sufferings had made him famous throughout England. He became the actual head of the JJaptist community. Men called him, half in ironj', half in seriousness, Bishop Bunyan, and he passed the rest of his life honourably and innocently, occupied in writing, preaching, district visiting, and opening daughter cliurches. Happy in las work, hap- py in the sense that his influence was daily extending — spreading over liis own country, and to the far-off settle- ments in America, he spent his last years in his own Land of Beulah, Doubting Castle out of sight, and the towers and minarets of Emmanuel Land growing nearer and clear- er as the days went on. He had not detected, or at least, at first, he did not de- tect, the sinister purpose which lay behind the Indulgence. The exception of the Roman Catholics gave him perfect confidence in the Government, and after his release he published a Discourse iqoon Antichrist, with a preface, in which he credited Charles with the most righteous inten- tions, and urged his countrymen to be loyal and faithful to him. His object in writing it, he said, " was to testify his loyalty to the King, his love to the brethren, and his service to his country." Antichrist was, of course, the [chap. TI.] THE BEDFORD GAOL. 87 Pope, the deadliest of all enemies to vital Christianity. To its kini,^s and prinees Enirjand owed its past deliver- ance from him. To kings England must look for his tinal overthrow. "As the noble King Henry VIII. did cast down the Antichristian worship, yn he cast down the laws that held it up; so also did the good King Edward, his son. The brave Queen Elizabeth, also, the sister of King Edward, left of things of this nature, to her lasting fame, behind her." Cromwell he dared net mention— perhaps he did not wish to mention him. But he evidently believed that there was better hope in Charles Stuart than in conspiracy and revolution. " Kings," he said, " must be the nu^n that sx.^.i! down with Antlcbrist, and they shall down with her in God's time. God hath begun to draw the hearts of some of them from her already, and He will set them in time against her round about. If, therefore, they do not that work so fast as we would have them, let us exercise pa- tience and iiopc in God. 'Tis a wonder they go as fast as they do, since the concerns of whole kingdoms lie upon their shoulders, and there are so many Sanballats and To- bias's to flatter tliem and misinform them. Let the King have visibly a place in your hearts, and with heart and mouth give God thanks for him. He is a better Saviour of us than we may be aware of, and hath delivered us from more deaths than we can tell how to think. We are bidden to give God thanks for all men, and in the first place for kings, and all that are in authority. Be not an- gry with them— no, not in thy thought. But consider, if they go not in the work of Reformation so fast as thoii wouldest they should, the fault may be thine. Know that thou also hast thy cold and chill frames of heart, and sit- I il ,' * i ti.^BXt x,mm i 'i pM T t- -j"-.^^. 88 BUN Y AN. [chap. ti. A .1 i^ test still when thou shouUlcst bo up Jind doin^f. Pray for the loii;orous uiuler the least promisiuo; conditions. All mankind beitifv under sin to- gether, he has no favourites to flatter, no op[)onents to mis- represent. There is a kindliness in his descriptions even of the Evil One's attacks upon himself. The Pilf/riui's Progress, though professedly an allegoric story of the Protestant plan of salvation, is conceived in the large, wide spirit of humanity itself. Anglo-Catholic and Lutheran, Calvinist and Deist can alike read it with delight, and find their own theories in it. Even the llo- manist has only to blot out a few paragraphs, and can dis- cover no purer model of a Christian life to place in the hands of his children. The religion of The Pilgrwi's Progress is the religion wliich must be always and every- where, as long as man believes that he has a soul and is responsible for his actions ; and thus it is that, while theo- logical folios once devoured as manna from Heaven now lie on the bookslielves dead as Egyptian mummies, this book is wrouglit into the mind and memory of every well- conditioned Englisli or American child ; while the matured man, furnished with all the knowledge which literature can teach him, still finds the adventures of Christian as charm- ing as the adventures of Ulysses or yEneas. He sees there the reflexion of himself, the familiar features of liis own nature, which remain the same from era to era. Time ^ < [CIIAP. liil)it liiin- laractiT, if ts best, as y with rc- syiiipathy isapprovcs oils as he s hiiinan. the least or sin to- ils to mis- ions oven 1 allci^oric iceived in o-Catholic id it Avitli n the llo- d can dis- ico in the Pilgrirn's md evciT- )ul and is Idle thco- avcn now iniics, this very wcll- 3 matured •aturo can as charm- sees there f his own •a. Time TII.") LIFE AND DEATH OF MR. HADMAN. 91 cannot impair its interest, or intellectual progress make it cease to be true to experience. But The Pilfjrhns Progress, though the best known, is not the only work <.f imay fuitli, lier songs my peace ; When r believe and sing, my doublings cease. Tlioiijrli the Globe Theatre was, in the opinion of Non- conformists, "the heart of Satan's empire," Biinyan must yet have known .soniething of Shak.spcare. In the sccontl part of The Pilgrhn's Prof/ress we find :— " Who would true valour see. Let him conic hither; One here will constant be, Come wind, come weather." The resemblance to the song in As Vou Like It is too near to be accidental : — " Who doth ambition shun, And loves to be in the sun ; Seeking the food he eats, And pleased with what he gets. Come hither, come hither, come hither. Here shall be no enemy, Save winter and rough weather." Bunyan may, porliaps, have heard the lines, and the rhymes may have clung to him without his knowing whence they came. But he would never have been heard of outside his own communion, if lijn imagination had found no better form of expression for itself than verse. ^ 94 BUXYAX. [niAP. J His ospecuil gift was for allogory, the single form of iin- ..'igi 11 alive fiction wliicli he would not have considered triv- ial, and his especial instrument was plain, unaffected Saxon prose. The Hijhj War is a people's Paradise Lost and I'aradise llegaiiicd in one. The Life of Mr. Badman is a didactic talc, describing the career of a vulgar, middlc- chiss, unprincipled scoundrel. Tliesc are properly Bunyan's " works," the results of his life, so far as it affects the present generation of English- men ; and as they are little known, I shall give an account of each of them. The Life of Badman is presented as a dialogue between ]Mr. Wiseman and j\Ir. Attentive. Mr. Wiseman tells the story, Mr. Attentive comments upon it. The names recall Bunyan's Avell- known manner. The figures stand for typical characters ; but as the dramatis persona; of many writers of fiction, while professing to be beings of flesh and blood, are no more than shadows, so Bunyan's shad- ows are solid men, whom we can feel and handle. Mr. Badman is, of course, one of the " reprobate." Bunyan considered theoretically that a reprobate may to outward appearance have the graces of a saint, and that there may be little in his conduct to mark his true charac- ter. A reprobate may be sorry for his sins, he may repent and lead a good life. lie may reverence good men, and may try to resemble them ; he may pray, and his prayers may be answered ; he may have the spirit of God, and may rec uvo another heart, and yet he may be under the covenant of works, and may be eternally lost. This Bnn- yan could say while he was writing theology ; but art has its rules as well as its more serious sister, and when he had to draw a living specimen, he drew him as he had seen him in his own Bedford ncifrhbourhood. ^m [chap. vn.] LIFP] AND DEATH OF MR. BADMAX. 95 Biidinan showed fi'oiu cliildhood a propensity for evil. He was so "addicted to lying that his parents could not distinguish when he was speaking the tiiitli. He would invent, tell, and stand to the lies which he invented, with such an audacious face, that one might read in his very countenance the symptoms of a hard and desperate heart. It was not the fault of his parents; they were much de- jected at the beginjiiugs of their son; nor did lie want counsel and correction, if that would have made him bet- ter; but all availed nothing," Lying was not Badman's only fault, lie took to pil- fering and stealing. He robbed his neighbours' orchards. lie picked up money if he found it lying about, Espe- cially, Mr, Wiseman notes that he hated Sundays. " Read- ing Scriptures, godly conferences, repeating of sermons^ and prayers, were things that he could not away with," "He was an enemy to that day, because more restraint was laid upon him from his own ways than was possible on any other," Mr, Wiseman never doubts that the Puritan Sunday ought to have h- -n appreciated by little boys. If a child disliked it, the Cc. ..,o could only be his own wicked- ness. Young Badinan " was greatly given also to swearing and cursing." " He made no more of it" than Mr. Wise" man made "of telling his fingers," "He counted it a glory to swear and curse, and it was as natural to him as to eat, drink, or sleep," Bunyan, in this description, is supposed to have taken the picture from himself. But too much may be inade of this. He was thinking, per- haps, of what he might have been if God's grace had not preserved him. He himself was saved. Badman is repre- sented as given over from the first. Anecdotes, howev- er, arc told of contemporary providential judgments upon swearers, which had much impressed Bunyan, One was of il 96 BUN Y AX. [chap. 'if* il1 a certain Dorothy Matcly, a woman whose business was to wash rubbish at the Derby lead-mines. Dorothy (it was in the year when Banyan was first imprisoned) liad stolen twopence from the coat of a boy who was workin-T near her. When the boy taxed her with liaving robbed him, she wished the ground might swallow her up if she liad ever touclicd his money. Presently after, some children, who were watching her, saw a movement in the bank on which she was standing. They called to her to take care, but it was too late. The bank fell in, and she was carried down along with it. A man ran to help her, but the sides of the pit were crumbling round her : a large stone ffll on lier head ; the rubbish followed, and she was overwhelmed. When she was dug out afterwards, the pence were found in her pocket. ]>unyan was perfectly satisfied that her death was supernatural. To discover miracles is not pecul- iar to Catholics. They will be found wlierever there is an active belief in immediate providential government. Those more cautious in forming their conclusions will think, perhaj)s, that the woman was working above some shaft in the mine, that the crust had suddenly broken, and that it would equally have fallen in, when gravitation required it to fall, if Dorothy Mately had been a saint. They will remember the words about the Tower of Siloam. But to return to Badman. His father, being unable to manage so unpromising a child, bound him out as an apprentice. The master to whom he was assigned was as good a man as the father could find : upright. God-fearing, and especially consider- ate of his servants, lie never worked them too hard. He left them time to read and prav. He admitted no lio-lit or mischievous books within his doors. lie was not one of those whose religion " hung as a cloke in his house, and ^■S' [chap. VII.] LIFE AND DEATH OF MR. BADMAN. 07 was never soon on liim wlion he went abroad." His house- hold was as well fed and cared for as himself, and he re- quired nothing of others of which he did not set them an example in his own person. This ' •) did his best to reclaim young Badman, and was p;. -ilarly kind to him. But his exertions were thrown p.svjiy. The good-for-nothing youtli read filthy ro- mances on the sly. lie fell asleep in church, or made eyes at the pretty girls. lie made acquaintance with low com- panions. Ho became profligate, got drunk at ale-houses, sold his master's property to get money, or stole it out of the cash-box. Thrice ne ran away and was taken back again. The third time he was allowed to go. "The House of Correction would have been the most fit for him, but thither his master was loath to send him, for the love he bore his father." He was again apprenticed; this time to a master like himself. Being wicked, he was given over to wickedness. The ways of it were not altogether pleasant. He was fed worse and ho was worked harder than he had been before ; when he stole, or neglected his business, he was beaten. He liked his new place, how^ever, better than the old. " At least, there was no godliness in the house, which he hated worst of all." So far, Bunyan's hero was travelling the usual road of the Idle xVpprentice, and the gallows would have been the commonplace ending of it. But this would not have answered Bunyan's purpose. He wished to represent the good-for-nothing character, under the more instructive as- pect of worldly success, which bad men may arrive at as well as good, if they are prudent and cunning. Bunyan gives his hero every chance. He submits him from the first to the best influences ; he creates opportunities for re- i ' !t 08 BUNYAX. [chap. i( I V pcntanco at every stage of a long career— opportunities which the reprobate nature cannot profit by, yet increases its guilt by neglecting, Badinan's term being out, his father gives liini money and sets him up as a tradesman on his own account, Mr. Attentive considers this to have been a mistake, Mr. Wiseman answers that, even in the most desperate cases, kindness in parents is more likely to succeed than severity, and, if it fails, they will have the less to reproach them- selves with. The kindness is, of course, thrown away. Badman continues a loose blackguard, extravagant, idle, and dissolute. He comes to the edge of ruin. His situa- tion obliges him to think; and now the interest of the story begins. He must repair his fortune by some means or other. The easiest way is by marriage. There was a young orphan lady in the neighbourhood, wlio was well off and her owa mistress. She was a " professor," eao-er- ly given to religion, and not so wise as she ought to have been, Badman pretends to be converted. He reforms, or seems to reform. He goes to meeting, sings hymns, adopts the most correct form of doctrine, tells the lady that he does not want her money, but that he wants a com- panion who will go with him along the road to Heaven, He was plausible, good-looking, and, to all appearance, as abv.irbod as herself in the one thing needful. The con- gregation warn her, but to no purpose. She marries him, and finds wliat she has done too late. In lier fortune he has all that he wanted. He swears at her, treats her bru- tally, brings prostitutes into his house, laughs at her relig- ion, and at length orders her to give it up. When she re- fuses, Bunyan intro luces a special feature of the times, and makes Badman threaten to turn informer, and bring her favourite minister to gaol. The informers were the natu- [chap. Til.] LIFE AND DEATH OF MR. BADMAN. 99 ral but most accursed products of the Conventicle Acts. Poimlar abhorrence relieved itself by legends of the dread- ful judgments which had overtaken these wretches. In St. Xeots an informer was jitten by a dog. The wound gangrened, and the flesh rotted off his bones. In Bedford ''there was one W. S." (Bunyan probably knew him too well), " a man of very wicked life, and he, when there seemed to be countenance given it, would needs turn informer. Well, so he did, and was as diligent in his busi- ness as most of them could be. lie would'watch at nights, climb trees, and range the woods of days, if possible to^find out the mceters, for then they were forced to meet in the fields. Yea, he would curse them bitterly, and swore most fearfully what he would do to them when he found them. Well, after he had gone on like a Bedlam in his course awhile, and had done some mischief to the people, he was stricken by the hand of God. He was taken with a falter- ing in his speech, a weakness in the back sinews of his neck, that ofttimes he held up his head by strength of hand. After this his speech went quite away, and he could speak no more than a swine or a bear. Like one of them he would gruntle and make an ugly noise, according as he was offended or pleased, or would have anything done. He walked about till God liad made a sufficient spectacle of his judgments for his sin, and then, on a sudden, he was stricken, and died miserably." Badman, says Mr. Wiseman, "had malice enough in his heart " to turn informer, but he was growing prudent and liad an eye to the future. As a tradesman he had to live by his neighbours. He knew that they would not forgive him, so " he iiad that wit in his anger that he did it not." Nothing else was neglected to make the unfortunate wife miserable. She bore him seven children, also tvpical fi"-- 5* .1 = s i- M ' kj i I t,i i ■ if : i l^^fl^l i ! ■P9B 1;; ' sHJ^H 100 BUXYAN. [chap. ^ 1^^ iircs. "One wiis a very gracious child, tliat loved its moth- er dearly. This child Mr, Badinan could not abide, and it oftcnest felt the weight of Its father's fingers. Three were as bad as liiniself. The others that remained became a kind of mongrel professors, not so bad as their father nor so good as their mother, but betwixt tlieni both. They had their motlier's notions and their father's actions. Their father did not like them because they had their mother's tongue. Their mother did not like them be- cause tliey had their father's heart and life, nor were they fit company for good or bad. They were forced with Esau to join in affinity with Ishmael — to wit, to look out for a people that were hypocrites like themselves, and with them they matched and lived and died." Badman, meanwhile, with the help of his wife's fortune, grew into an important person, and his character becomes a curious study. "lie went," wo are told, " to scliool witli the devil, from his childhood to the end of his life." lie was shrewd in matters of business, began to extend his op- erations, and " drove a great trade." He carried a double face. He was evil witli tlie evil. He pretended to be good with the good. In religion he affected to be a free- thinker, careless of death and judgment, and ridiculing those wlio feared them " as frighted with unseen bug- bears." But lie wore a mask when it suited him, and ad- mired himself for the ease with which he could assume whatever aspect was convenient. "I can be religious and irreligious," he said; "I can be anything or nothing. I can swear, and speak against swearing. I can lie, and speak against lying. I can drink, wench, be unclean, and defraud, and not be troubled for it. I can enjoy myself, and am master of my own ways, not they of me. This I have attained with much study, care, and pains." "An [CIIAK Til.] LIFE AND DEATH OF MR. BADMAN. 101 Atheist Badinan was, if such a tiling as an Atheist could be. lie was not alone in that mystery. There was abun- dance of men of the same mind and the same i)iinciplc. He was only an arch or chief one among them." Mr. Badman now took to speculation, which IJunyan's knowledge of business enabled him to describe with in- structive minuteness. His adventures were on a large scale, and by some mistakes and by personal extravagance he had nearly ruined himself a second time. In thircon- dition he discovered a .-ineans, generally supposed to be a more modern invention, of "getting money by hatfuls." " He gave a sudden and great rush into several men's debts to the value of four or five thousand pounds, driving at the same time a very great trade by selling many things for less than they cost him, to get him custom and bliml his creditors' eyes. When he had well feathered his nest with other men's goods and money, after a little while he breaks ; while he had by craft and knavery made so sure of what he had that his creditors could not touch a pen- ny. He sends mournful, sugared letters to them, desiring them not to bo severe with him, for lie boro towards all men an honest mind, and would pay them as far as he was able. He talked of the greatness of the taxes, the badness of the times, his losses by bad debts, and he brought them to a composition to take five sliillings in the pound. His release was signed and sealed, and Mr. Badman could now put his head out-of-doors again, and be a better man than when he shut up shop by several thousands of pounds." Twice or three times ho repeated the same trick ivith equal success. It is likely enough that Bunyan was draw- ing from life, and perhaps from a member of his own con- gregaUon ; for he says that " he had known a professor do it." He detested nothing so much as sham relitrion i\ >,i ^ !' 102 BUXYAX. [chap. Hi which \va3 jjiit on as a pretence. "A professor," he cx- chiinis, "and practise such villanios as these! Sucli an one is nut worthy the name. Go, professors, go — leave off i)rofession, unless you will lead your lives according to your profession. Better never profess than make pro"fes- sion a stalking-horse to sin, deceit, the devil, and hell." r.ankrnptcy was not the only art by which Badinan piled up his fortune. The seventeenth century was not so far behind us as we sometimes persuade ourselves. "lie dealt by deceitful weights and measures, lie kept weights to buy by, and weights to sell by ; measures to buy by, and measures to sell by. Those he bought by were too big, and those he sold by were too little. If he had to do with other men's weights and measures, he could use a thing called sleight of hand, lie had the art, besides, to misreckon men in their accounts, whether bv weight or measure or money ; and if a question was made of his faithful dealing, he liad his servants ready that would vouch and swear to his look or word. He would sell goods that cost him not the best pi'ice by far, for as much as he sold his best of all for. He had also a trick to mingle his commodity, that that which was bad might go off with the least mistrust. If any of liis custoiiicrs paid him money, he would call for payment a second time, and if they could not produce good and sufficient ground of the payment, a hundred to one but they paid it again." "To buy in the cheapest market, and sell in the dear- est," was Mr. Badman's common rule in business. Ac- cording to modern political economy, it is the cardinal principle of wholesome trade. In Bunyan's opinion it was knavery in disguise, and certain to degrade and demoral- ise every one who acted upon it. Bunyan had evidently [chap. Til.] LIFE AND DKATIl OF MH. HADMAX. 103 thought oil the subject. Mr. Attentive is made to ob- ject :— " But you know that there is no settled price set by God upon any commodity that is bou.tjht or sokl under tlic sun ; but all thinnjs that we buy and sell do ebb and flow as to price, like the tide. How then shall a man of tender conscience do, neither to wroni? the seller, buyer, nor himself in the buyin.,^ and sellini^ of commodities?" Mr. Wiseman answers in the spirit of our old Acts of Parliament, before political economy was invented: " Let a man have conscience towards God, charity to his neighbours, and moderation in dealinjr. Let the trades- man consider that tliere is not that in great gettings and in abundance which the most of men do suppose; for all that a man has over and above what serves for iiis present necessity and supply serves only to feed the lusts of the eye. Be thou confident that God's eyes arc upon thy ways ; that He marks them, writes them down, and seafs them up in a bag against the time to come. Be sure that thou rememberest that thou knowest not the day of thy deatli. Thou shalt have nothing that thou mayest so much as carry away in thy hand. Guilt shall go wi'th thee if thou hast gotten thy substance dishonestly, and they to whom thou shalt leave it shall receive it to their Imrt. These things duly considered, I will shew thee how thou should'st live in the practical part of this art. Art tliou to buy or sell ? If thou sellest, do not commend. If thou buyest, do not dispraise any otherwise but to give the thing that thou hast to do with its just value and worth. Art thou a seller, and do things grow cheap? set not thy hand to help or hold them up higher. Art thou a buyer, and do things grow dear? use no cunning or deceitful lan- guage to pull them down. Leave things to the Providence I il :l. /'"'' '' * I i ■1 104 BUNYAN. [chap. of God, and do thou with modorntion submit to his luuid. Hurt not thy neighbour by crying out, Scarcity, scarcity ! beyond the truth of tilings. Especially take heed of do- ing tliis by way of a prognostic for time to come. This wicked thing inay be done by hoarding up (food) when the hunger and necessity of the poor calls for it. If things rise, do thou be grieved. Be also moderate in all thy sell- ings, and bo sure let the poor have a pennyworth, and sell thy corn to those who arc in necessity ; which thou wilt do when thou showest mercy to the poor in thy selling to him, and when thou undersellest ihe market for his sake because he is poor. This is to buy and sell with a good conscience. The buyer thou wrongest not, thy conscience thou wrongest not, thyself thou wrongest not, for God will surely recompense with thee." These views of Bunyan's arc at issue with modern science, but his principles and ours are each adjusted to the objects of desire which good men in those days, and good men in ours, have respectively set before themselves. If wealth means money, as it is now assumed to do, Bun- yan is wrong, and modern science right. If wealth means moral welfare, then those who aim at it will do well to follow Bunyan's advice. It is to be feared that this part of his doctrine is less frequently dwelt upon by those who profess to admire and follow him, than the theory of im- puted righteousness or justification by faith. Mr. Badnian, by his various ingenuities, became a wealthy man. His character as a tradesman could not have been a secret from his neighbours, but money and success col- oured it over. The world spoke well of him. He be- came " proud and haughty," took part in public affairs, " counted himself as wise as the wisest in the country, as good as the best, and as beautiful as he that had the most [chap. v,,.] LIFE AND DEATH OF MR. DADMAN. lOS of it." " lie took ^roat (k"Iii,^lit in praisiiifr iijinself, and as :mu;h in tlio praises that otiiers gave him." " lie could not abide that any should think themselves above hini, or that tlieir wit and personao-o should be by others set be- f^ his." He had an objection, nevertheless, to beinj? cailed proud, and wlien Mr. Attentive asked why, his coin^- panion answered with a touch which reminds us of Do Foe, tliat " JJadman did not tell him the reason. He sup- posed it to be that whicli was common to all vile persons. They loved their vice, but cared not to bear ita name." Badman said he was unwilling to seem singular and fan- tastical, and in this way he justified his expensive and lux- urious way of living. Singulaiity of all kinds he affected to dislike, and for that reason his special pleasure was to note the faults of professors. " If he could get anytiiing by the end that had scandal in it— if it did but touch pro" fessors, however falsely reported— oh, then he would glory, laugh and be glad, and lay it upon the whole party. Hang these rogues, lie would say, there is not a barrel better he^ ring in all the holy brotherhood of them. Like to like, quote the devil to the collier. This is your precise crew^ and then he would send them all home with a curse." Thus I3unyan developed his specimen scoundrel, till he brought him to the high altitudes of worldly prosperity ; skilful in every villanous art, skilful equally in keeping out of the law's liands, and feared, admired, and respect^ ed by all his neighbours. The reader who desires to see Providence vindicated would now expect to find him detected in some crimes by which justice could lay hold, and poetical retribution fall upon him in the midst of his triumph. An inferior artist would certainly have allowed his story to end in this way. But' Bunyan, satisfied though he was that dramatic judgjnents did overtake of- p ♦ \l 106 BUN VAN. [cirAP. fenders in this world with direct and stnrtlini; aiipropriatc- ness, was yet nwaro tliat it was often otherwise, and that the worst fate which could ho inflicted on a conii)letely worthless person was to allow hini to work out his career unvisfk'd hy any penalties which niii^ht have disturbed Jii'i conscience and occasioned lii.> aniendiuent. He ehnso to make liis story natural, and to confine liinisrlf to natural maehiiiery. The juds^in'rit to come Mr. IJadiuaM Iaut:;hed at '*(is old woman's fable," but his couraf!;e lasted only as long as he was well and stroui;. One iii^ht, as hf was riding home dni k, his horse fell, and lie broke his leg. '* You would not think," says Mr. Wiseman, " how ho swore at first. Then, coming to himself, and finding ho was badly hurt, ho cried out, after the manner of such, Lord, help me ! Lo'-d, have mercy on mc ! good fJod, deliver me ! and the like. lie was picked up and taken home, where he lay some time. In his pain he called on God ; but whether it was that his sin might bo pardoned, and his soul saved, or whether to be rid of his pa.n," Mr. Wise- man "could not determine." This leads to several stories of drunkards which Bunyan clearly believed to be literally true. Such facts or legends were the food on which his mind had been nourished. They were in the air which contemporary England breathed. "I have read, in Mr. Clarke's Look hiff-r/Iass for Sinners, Mr. Wiseman said, " that upon a time a certaiu drunken fellow boasted in his cups that there was neither heaven nor hell. Also, he said he believed that man had no soul, and that for his own part he would sell his soul to any that would buy it. Then did ono of his companions buy it of him for a cup of wine, and presently the devil, in man's shape, bought it of that man again at the same price; and so, in the presence of them all, laid hold of tho 4. [(■HAP. Til.] MFK AND DKATII OF MK. U ADMAN. m 8oul-sc'!lor, and carrictl him away throiigli tlio air, so tlii»t ho was 1 o more heard of." Ap;aiii . "There was one at Salisbury drinking . i i ( 'irouHinf,' at a tavern, and lie draii,. a heaitli to the ,11, sayini; that if tl '! devil wouhl not eome and jiledi,'o liiin, he could nut believe that there was cither God or devil. Whcrt'U{)on his companions, stri ken witli f''ar, hastened out of the room ; and presently after, hearinsjf a hideous noise and smellinnr a stinking savour, the vintner ran into th«^ rliam- ber, and eoming in ho missed his guest, and found the window broken, the iron bars in it bowed and all bloody, but the man was never heard of afterwards." These visitations were answers to a direct challenge of the evil spirit's existence, and were thus easy to be ac- counted for. r.ut no devil came for Mi. Uadman. He clung to his unfortunate, neglected wife. "She became his dear wife, his godly wife, his honest wife, his duck, his dear and all." ]Ie thought he was dying, and hell -ind all its horrors rose up before him. "Fear was in hi- face, and in his tossings to and fro he would often sav. I am undone, I am undone; my vile life hath undone me!" Atheism did not help him. It never helped anyon iu such extremities, Mr. Wiseman said, as he had knowi in another instance: — "There was •>. man dwelt about twelve miles off from us," he said, " that had so trained up himself in his Athe- istical notions, that at last he attempted to write a book against Jesus Christ and the Divine authority of the Scriptures. I think it was not printed. Well, after many days God struck him with sickness, whereof he died. So, being sick, and musing of his former doings, the book that he had written tore his conscience as a lion w. uld I i I /^ i.V ') i 108 BUNYAX. [CIIAI'. tear a kid. Some of my friends went to sec liini ; and as they were in liis chamber one day, lie hastily called for pen and ink and paper, which, when it was given to him, lie took it and Avrit to this purpose : " I, such an one in such a town, must cjo to hell-fire for writin<^ a book aijainst Jesus Christ." He would have leaped out of the window to have killed himself, but was by them prevented of that, so he died in his bed by such a death as it was." Badman seemed equally miserable. But death -bcil repentances, as Buuyan sensibly said, were seldom of more value than " the howliufj of a doii'." The broken lee: "as set ai;'ain. The pain of body went, and with it the pain of mind. " lie was assisted out of his uneasiness," says Bunyan, with a characteristic hit at the scientific views then coming into fashion, " by his doctor," who told him that his alarms had come " from an affection of the brain, caused by want of sleep ;" " they were nothing but vapours and the effects of his distemper." lie gathered his spirits together, and became the old man once more. llis poor wife, who had believed him penitent, broke her heart, and died of the disappointment. The husband gave himself up to loose connection;; with abandoned women, one of whom persuaded him one day, when he was drunk, to make her a promise of marriage, and she held hiin to his word. Then retribution came upon him, with the coarse commonplace, yet rigid justice which fact really deals out. The second bad wife avenged the wrongs of the first innocent wife. He wjis mated with a companion " who could fit him with cursing and swearing, give him oath for oath, and curse for curse. They would fight, and fly at each other like cat and dog." In this condition — for Bunyan, before sending his hero to his account, gave him a protracted spell of earthly discomforts — they lived [CIIAP. VII.] LIFE AND DEATH UF Mil. HAD.MAX. 109 sixteen yoar.s together. Fortune, mIio liad so long favour- ed his .speculations, turned her back upon him. Between them they " sinned all his wealth away," and at last parted "as poor as howlets." Then came the end. Badinan was still in middle life, and had naturally a powerful constitution; but his "cups and his queans" had undermined his strength. Drop.sy came, and gout, with worse in his bowels, and " on the top of them all, as the captain of the men of death that came to take him away," consumption. Eunyan was a true artist, though he knew nothing of the rules, and was not aware that he was an artist at all. He was not to be tempted into spoiling a natural story with the melo- dramatic horrors of a sinner's death-bed. He had let his victim " howl " in the usual way, when he meant him to recover. lie had now simply to conduct him to the gate of the place where he was to receive the reward of his in- iquities. It was enough to bring him thither still impeni- tent, with the grave solemnity with wliich a felon is taken to execution. ^ "As his life was full of sin," says Mr. Wiseman, "so his death was without repentance. lie had not, in all the time of his sickness, a sight and a sense of his sins; but was as much at quiet as if he had never sinned in his life ; lie was as secure as if lie had been sinless as an angel. When he drew near his end, there was no more alteration in him than what was made by his disease upon his body. He was the self-same Mr. Badman still, not only in name but in condition, and that to the very day of his death and the moment in which he died. There seemed not to bo in it to the standcrs-by so much as a strong struggle of nature. He died like a Iamb, or, as men call it, like a chrisom child, quietly and without fear." ! il ii,i )P no BUNYAX. [chap. j !f i i I To wliich end of Mr. Badman Bunyan attaches tlic fol- lowing remarks : " If a wicked man, if a man who lias lived all his days in notorious sin, dies quietly, his quiet dying is so far from being a sign of his being saved that it is an incontestable proof of his damnation. No man can be saved except he repents ; nor can he repent that knows not that he is a sinner : and he that knows himself to be a sinner will, I warrant him, be molested for his knowledge before he can die quietly. I am no admirer of sick-bed repentance; for I think verily it is seldom good for any- thing. But I see that he that hath lived in sin and pro- fancness all his days, as Badman did, and yet shall die quietly — that is, without repentance steps in bet\v(!en his life and his death — is assuredly gone to hell. When God would show the greatness of his anger against sin and sin- ners in one word, lie saith, Let them alone ! Let them alone — that is, disturb them not. Let them go on with- out control. Let the devil enjoy them peaceably. Let him carry them out of the world, unconverted, quietly. This is the sorest of judgments. I do not say that all wicked men that are molested at their death with a seaso of sin and fear of hell do therefore go to heaven ; for some are made to see and are left to despair. I>ut I say there is no surer sign of a man's damnation than to die quietly after a sinful life — than to sin and die with a heart that cannot repent. The opinion, therefore, of the common people of this kind of death is frivolous and vain." So ends this very remarkable story. It is extremely interesting, merely as a picture of vulgar English life in a provincial town, such as Bedford was when Bunyan lived there. The drawing is so good, the details so minute, the conception so uncxaggerated, that we are disposed to be- lieve that wc must have a I'eal history before us. But such a. [ CI I A I'. vn.] LIFE AND Df]ATII OF MU. BADMAN". HI a supposition is only a compliment to the skill of the com- poser. Bnnyan's inventive faculty was a spriniv that never ran dry. He had a manner, as I said, like De Foe's, of creatini; the allusion that we are readinpr realities, by little touches such as " I do not know ;" " He did not tell me this;" or the needless introduction of particulars irrelevant to the general plot such as we always stumble on iji life, and writers of fiction usually omit. Bunyan was never prosecuted for libel by Badman's relations, and the char- acter is the corresponding- contrast to Christian in The Pihjrinis Progress, the pilgrim's journey being in the op- posite direction to the other place. Throughout we arc on the solid earth, amidst real experiences. No demand is made on our credulity by Providential interpositions, ex- cept in the intercalated anecdotes which do not touch the story itself. The wicked man's career is not brought to tne abrupt or sensational issues so much in favour with or- dinary didactic tale-writers. Such Issues are the exception, not the rule, and the edifying story loses its effect when the reader turns from it to actual life, and perceives that the majority are not punished in any such way. Bunvan conceals nothing, assumes nothing, and exaggerates noth- ing. He makes his bad man sharp and shrewd, lie al- lows sharpness and shrewdness to bring him the rewards which such qualities in fact command. Badman is suc- cessful, he is powerful ; he enjoys all the pleasures which money can buy; his bad wife helps him to ruin, but oth- erwise he is not unhappy, and he dies in peace. Bunyan has made him a brute, because su?h men do become brutes. It is the real punishment of brutal and selfish habits. There the figure stands : a picture of a man in the rank of English life with which Bunyan was most familiar, travelling along the primrose path to the everlast- i ! f\ t i ! :'!" 112 BUNYAX. [chap. VII. inff bonfire, as the wav to Einnianuol's Land was throufrli the Slough of Despond and the Valley of the Shadow of Death. I'leasnres are to be found among the primroses, such pleasures as a brute can be gratified by. Yet the reader feels that, even if there was no bonfire, he would still prefer to be with Christian. ..;i*.-W«>r'«-"w^-:.; =*>'*»■ - CHAPTER VIIL THE HOLY WAR, The supernatural has been snccessfnlly represented in po- etry, painting, or sculpture, only at particular periods of human history, and under peculiar mental conditions. The artist must himself believe in the supernatural, or his de- scription of it will be a sham, without dignity and without credibility. Ho must feel himself able, at the same time, to treat the subject which he selects with freedom, throw- ing his own mind boldly into it, or he will produce, at best, the hard and stiff forms of literal tradition. Vs'lwn Benvenuto Cellini was preparing to make an image of the Virgin, he declares gravely that Our Lady appeared to him, that lie might know what she was like ; and so real was the apparition that, for many months after, he says that his friends, when the room was dark, could see a faint aureole about his head. Yet Benvenuto worked as if his own brain was partly the author of what he produced, and, like other contemporary artists, used his mistresses for his models, and was no servile copyist of phantoms seen in visions. There is a truth of the imagination, and there is a truth of fact, religion hovering between them, translating one into the other, turning natural phenomena into the activity of personal beings ; or giving earthly names and habitations to mere creatures of frncy. Imagination H H i\ 1 ( 114 BUNYAN. [ciup. creates a mytliology. The priest takes it and fashions out of it u theoloy-y, a ritual, or a sacred liistory. So long as tlie priest can convince the world that lie is dealiiio- with literal facts he liolds reason prisoner, and imagination is his servant. In the twilight, when dawn is coining near but has not yet come ; when the uncertain nature of the legend is felt, though not intelligently discerned — imagi- nation is the first to resume its liberty ; it takes possession of its own inheritance, it dreams of its gods and demi- gods, as Benevenuto dreamt of tlie Virgir, and it re-shapes the priest's traditions in noble and beautiful forms. Homer and the Greek drannitists would not have dared to bring the gods upon the stage so freely liad tliey believed Zeus and Apollo were living persons, like the man in the next street, who might call the poet to account for what they were made to do and say ; but ncitlier, on the other liand, could they liave been actively conscious that Zeus and Apolio were apparitions, which liad no existence except in their own brains. The condition is extremely peculiar. It can exist only in certain epochs, and in its nature is necessarily transitory. AVhere belief is consciously gone, the artist has no rever- ence for liis work, and, therefore, can inspire none. The greatest genius in the world could not reproduce another Athene like that of Phidias. But neither must the belief be too complete. The poet's tongue stammers when he would bring beings before ns who, though invisible, are awful personal existences, in whose stupendous presence we one day expect to stand. As long as the conviction survives that he is dealing with literal truths, he is safe only while he follows with shoeless feet the letter of the tradition, lie dares not step beyond, lest he degrade the Infinite to the human level, and if he is wira ho prefers to [chap. Tin.] "THE HOLY WAR." 113 content luniself with humbler .subjcct.s. A Christian artist can represent Jesns Christ as a man because He was a man, and because the details of the Gospel history leave room for the inia real treatment of truths hitherto sacred. They confound the representation with its object, and regard the whole of it as unreal together. These observations apply most immediately to Milton's Paradise Lost, and are meant to explain the unsatisfactori- ness of it. Milton himself was only partially cmancip.-.ted from the bondage of the letter ; half in earth, half *' paw- ing to get free," like his own lion. The war in licaven, the fall of the rebel angels, the horrid splendours of Pan- demonium seem legitimate subjects for Christian poetry. They stand for something which we regard as real, yet we are not bound to any actual opinions about them. Satan has no claim on reverential abstinence; and Paradise and the Fall of Man are perhaps sufficiently mythic to permit poets to take certain liberties with them, jjut even so far Milton has not entirely succeeded. His wars of the angels are shadowy. They have no substance, like the battles of Greeks and Trojans, or Centaurs and Lapitlnv ; and Satan could not be made interesting without touches of a nobler nature— that is, without ceasing to be the Satan of the 6 .0 116 BUNYAN. [chap. K ' r Cliristian rclio-ion. But this is not the worst. When wo are carried up into heaven, and licar tlic persons of tlie Trinity conversin<;' on the miscliiefs wliich have crept into the iinivor.se, and planninij; remedies and scliemes of salva- tion like I'liritan divines, we turn away incredulous and ro- sentfnl. Theologians may form such theories for them- selves, if not wisely, yet without offence. They may study the Avorld in which they are placed with the llrht which can be thrown upon it by the book wliich they call the Word of God. They may form their conclusions, invent their schemes of doctrine, and commend to their flocks the interpretation of the mystery at which they have arrived. The cycles and epicycles of the Ptolemaic astronomers were imperfect liypotheses, but they were stages on which the mind could vest for a mo ^ complete examination of the celestial phenomena. But the pocu does not offer us phrases and formulas ; he presents to us personalities, liv- ing and active, intlucnced by emotions and reasoning from premises; and when the unlimited and incomprehensible Being whoso attributes are infinite, of whom, from the in- adequacy of our ideas, we can only speak in negatives, is brought on the stage to talk like an ordinary man, we feel that Milton has mistaken the necessary limits of his art. When Faust claims affinity with the Plrdgeist, the spirit tells him to seek aflinities with beings which he can com- prehend. The commandment which forbade the represen- tation of God in a bodily form, forbids the poet equally to make God describe liis feelings and his purposes. Whore the poet would create a character he must himself com- prehend it first to its inmost fibre. He cannot compre- hend his own Creator. Admire as w^e may Paradise Lost ; try as we may to admire Paradise Regained ; acknowledge VIII.] "THE HOLY WAR." 117 as wo must the splendour of the imagery and the stately mareh of the verse— there comes upon us irresistiblv n sense of the unfitne.ss of the subject for Milton'.s troatm'cnt of it. If the story Avhich ho tells us is true, it is too mo- mentons to bo played with in poetry. Wo prefer to hear it in plain prose, with a minimum of ornament and the ut- most possible precision of statement. :\lilton himself had not arrived at thinkino: it to be a legend, a [)icture, like a Greek Mythology. His poem falls between two modes of treatment and two conceptions of truth ; we wonder, we recite, we api)laud, but something comes in between our minds and a full enjoyment, and it will not satisfy us bet- ter as time goes on. The same objection applies to The Hohj War of Bun- van. It i.s, as I said, a people's version of the same series of subjects— the creation of man, the fall of man, his re- demption, his ingratitude, his lapse, and again his restora- tion. The chief figures arc the same, the action is the same, though more varied and complicated, and the gen- eral effect is unsatisfactory from the same cause. Prose is less ambitious tlian poetry. There is an absence of at- tempts at grard effect.s. Tlicrc is no effort after sublimi- ty, and there >. consequently a lighter sense of incongrui- ty in the failure to reach it. On the other-hand, the^-e is the greater fulness of detail so characteristic of Bunyan's manner; and fulness of detail on a theme so far beyond our understanding is as dangerous as vague grandilo- quence. In The PilfirMs Pror/rcss wc are among genu- ine Imman beings. The reader knows the road too well which Christian follows. He has struggled with him in the Slough of Despond, lie has shuddered with him in the Valley of the Shadow of Death. e has groaned with him in the dungeons of Doubting Castle. He has I I li" 118 BUNYAN. [CIIAP. / ll' encountered on his journey the panic fellow-travellers. Who does not know Mr. Pliable, Mr. Obstinate, Mr. Fac- ing-botli-ways, Mr. Feeble Mind, and all the rest? They are re})resentativc realities, flesh of our Hesh, and bone of our bone, " If we prick them, they bleed ; if we tickle tliem, they laugh," or they make us langh. " They are warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer" as wo arc. The hu'uan actors in The Holy War are parts of men — special virtues, special vices : allegories in fact as well as in name, which all Bunyan's genius can only occa- sionally substantiate into persons. The plot of The Pil- ffrim's Progress is simple. The Jfofi/ War is prolonged through endless vicissitudes, with a doui)tful issue after all, and the inconiprehensibility of th'i Being who allows Satan to defy him so long and so successfully is unpleasantly and harshly brought home to us. True, it is so in life. Evil remains after all that has been done for us. ]>ui, life is confessedly a mystery. The JIolij War ])rofesses '.- inter- pret the mystery, and only restates the problem ir: a more elaborate form. Man Friday, on reading it, wor.ld have asked, even more emphatically, "Why God not kill the devil ?'' and llobinson Crusoe would have found no assist- ance in answering liim. For these reasons I cannot agree with Macaulay in thinking that, if there had been no Pil- grim's Pror/rcss, The Hob/ War would liave been the first of religious allegories. We may adm-re the workmanship, but the same undefined sense of unreality which pursues us through Milton's epic would liave interfered equally with tlic acceptance of this. The question to us is if the facts are true. If true, they reqnire no allegories to toueli either our hearts or our intellects. The Holy War would have entitled Bunyan to a place among the masters of English literature. It would never ll vm.] "THK HOLY WAR." 19 have made liis name a household word in even EiiLiinh- speaking family on the globe. The story, which I shall try to tell in an abridged iuriii, is introduced by a short prefatory poem. Works of fan- cy, Bunyaii tells us, are of many sorts, according to the author's humour. For himself ho says to liis reader — "I have soinctliing else to do Tliun write viiiii sstorics tliiis to tr<)iil)Io you. Wliut liore I siiy some men do know too well ; They can with tears and joy the story tell. Tiic town of Munsoul is well linown to many, Nor are licr troubles doubted of by any Timt are ac(iiialnted witli tho!lo of it not all uf one complexion nor yet of one lanuilding so curious, for its situation so eonnnodious, for ils privileges so advantageous, that with reference to its original (state) there was not its equal under heaven. The first founder was Sliaddai, who built it for his own delight. In the midst of the town was a famous and stately palace vliich Sliaddai intended for himself.* lie had no inten- t/'on of allowing strangers to intrude there. And the pc- tuliarity of the place was that the walls of Mansoul" could trover be broken down or hurt unless the townsmen con- Bontod. Mansoul had five gates which, in like manner, could only be forced if those within allowed it. These gates were Eargate. Eyegate, Montligate, Nosegate, and Feelgate. Thus p led, Mansoul was at first all that its founder could desire. It had the most excellent laws in the world. There was not a rogue or a rascal inside its whole precincts. The inhabitants were all true men. Now there was a certain giant named Diabolus — king of the blacks or negroes, as Bunyan noticeably calls them ' Bunyan says, in a marginal note, that by this palace he means the heart. ■^ The body. VIII.] "THE HOLY WAR." 121 -king —the nej^M-oes standing for sinnors or fallen angel8. Diab- olic liftd once been n servant of Sliaddui, one of the eliief in his territories. IVJdo and ambition bad led bim to aspire to tbo .rown wliieh '/as settled on Sbaddai's Son. Uo bad formed a conspiracy and planned a revolution. Siiaddai and bis Son, "being all eye," easily doteetcd the plot. Diaboltis and bis erew were bound in ebains, ban- ished, and thrown into a pit, there to "abide for ever." This was tlicir sentence; but out of the pit, in spite of it, they in some way contrived to escape. They ranged about full of malice against Siiaddai, and looking for means t(. injure him. They eamc at last on Mmisoul. They deter- mined to take it, and called a council to consi.ler bow it could best be done. Diabolus was aware of the condition that no one could enter without the inhabitants' consent. Aletto, Apollyon, Ueelzebub, Lucifer (I'agan and Christian demons intermixed indiifercntly) gave their several opin- ions. Diabolus at length, at Lucifer's suggestion, decided to assume the shape of one of the creatures over which Mansoul had dominion ; and he selected as the fittest that of a snake, whicli at that time was in great favour with the people as both harmless and wise. The population of Mansoul were simple, innocent folks who believed everything that was said to them. Force, however, might be necessary, as well as cunning, and the Tisiphone, a fury of the Lakes, was required to assist. The attempt was to be made at Eargate. A certain Cap- tain Resistance was in charge of this gate, whom Diabolus feared more than any one in the place. Tisiphone was to shoot bim. The plans being all laid, Diabolus in his snake's dress approached the wall, accompanied by one 111 Pause, a fa- mous orator, the Fury following behind. He asked for a f '!■ it ■I 122 BUN Y AN. [chap. ni parley with the licads of tlic town. Captain Resistance, two of the great nobles, Lord Innocent, and Lord Will be Will, with Mr. Conscience, the Recorder, and Lord Un- derstanding, the Lord Mayor, came to the gate to see what he wanted. Lord Will be Will plays a prominent part in the drama both for good and evil, lie is neither Free Will, nor Wilfulness, nor Inclination, but the quality which metaphysicians and theologians agree in describing as " the Will." "The Will" simply — a subtle something of great importance ; but what it is they have never been able to explain. Lord Will be Will inquired Diabolus's business. Diab- olus, " meek as a lamb," said he was a neighbour of theirs. He had observed with distress that they were living in a state of slavery, and he wished to help them to be free. Shaddai was no doubt a great prince, but he was an arbi- trary despot. There Avas no liberty where the laws were unreasonable, and Shaddai's laws were the reverse of rea- sonable. They had a fruit growing among them, in Man- soul, which they had but to eat to become wise. Knowl- edge was well known to be the best of possessions. Knowl- edge was freedom ; ignorance was bondage ; and yet Shaddai had forbidden them to touch this precious fruit. At that moment Captain Resistance fell dead, pierced by an arrrow from Tisiphone. Ill Pause made a flowing speech, in the midst of which Lord Innocent fell also, citlicr through a blow from Diabolus, or " overpowered by the stinking breath of the ola villain 111 Pause." The peo- ple flew upon the apple-tree ; Eargate and Eyegate were thrown open, and Diabolus was invited to come in ; when at once he became King of Mansoul, and established him- self in the castle.' ' The heart. [chap. VIII.] "THE nOLY WAR." 129 TJic magistrates were immediately changed. Lord Un- derstanding ceased to be Lord Mayor. Mr. Conscience was no longer left as Recorder. Diabolus built up a wall in front of Lord Understanding's palace, and shut off the light, " so that till Mansoul was delivered the old Lord Mayor was rather an impediment than an advantage to that famous town." Diabolus tried long to bring " Conscience " over to his side, but never quite succeeded. The Recorder became greatly corrupted, but he could not be prevented from now and then remembering Shaddai ; and when the fit was on him he would shake the toun with his excla- mations. Diabolus, therefore, had to try other methods with him. " lie had a way to make the old gentleman, when he was merry, unsay and deny what in his fits he had affirmed; and this was the next way to make him ridiculous, and to cause that no man should regard him." To make all secure, Diabolus often said, " Oh, Mansoul, consider that, notwithstanding the old gentleman's rage and the rattle of the high, thundering words, you hear nothing of Shaddai himself." The Recorder had pretend- ed that the voice of the Lord was speaking in him. Had this been so, Diabolus argued that the Lord would have done more than speak. " Shaddai," he said, " valued not the loss nor the rebellion of Mansoul, nor would he trouble himself with calling liis town to a reckoning." In this way the Recorder came to be generally hated, and more than once the people would have destroyed him. Happily his house was a castle near the water-works. When the rabble pursued him, he would pull up the sluices,' let in the flood, and drown all about him. Lord Will be Will, on the other hand, " as hiffh born .18 any in Mansoul," became Diabolus's principal miuister. ' Fenrs. I ( ! •■ • n t- 1 ' • f 124 BUN VAN. [chap. ■ IT' He had been the first to propose admitting Diabohis, and he was made C'aptain of the Castle, Governor of the Wall, and Keeper of the Gates. Will be Will had a clerk named Mr. Mind, a man every way like his Uiastcr, and Mansoul was thus brouirht "under the lusts" of Will and Intellect. Mr. Mind had in his house some old rent and torn parch- ments of the law of Shaddai. The Recorder had some more in his study ; but to these Will be Will paid no at- tention, and surrounded himself with officials who were all in Diabolus's interest. lie had as deputy one Mr. Affec- tion, "much debauched in his principles, so that he was called Vile Affection." Vile Affection married Mr. Mind's daughter, Carnal Lust, by whom he had three sons — Im- pudent, Black Mouth, and Hate Reproof ; and three daugh- ters — Scorn Truth, Slight Good, and Revenge. All traces of Shaddai were now swept away. His image, which had stood in the market-place, was taken down, and an artist called Mr. No Truth was employed to set up the image of Diabolus in place of it. Lord Lustings — " who never sa- voured good, but evil" — was chosen for the new Lord Mayor. Mr. Forget Good was appointed Recorder. There were new burgesses and aldermen, all with appropriate names, for which Bunyan was never at a loss — Mr. Incre- dulity, Mr. Haughty, Mr. Sweating, Mr. Hardheart, Mr. Piti- less, Mr. Fury, Mr. No Truth, Mr. Stand to Lies, Mr. False- peace, Mr. Drunkenness, Mr. Cheating, Mr. Atheism, and another ; thirteen of them in all. Mr. Incredulity wns the eldest, Mr. Atheism the youngest in the company — a shrewd and correct arrangement. Diabolus, on his part, set to work to fortify Mansoul. He built three fortresses —"The Hold of Defiance" at Eyegate, " that the light might be darkened there ;" " Midnight Hold " near the old Castle, to keep Mansoul from knowledge of itself ; and I I [chap. VIII.] «c "THE HOLY WAR." 125 'Sweet Sin Hold" in the market-place, tiiat there might be no desire of good there. These strongholds being established and garrisoned, Diabolus thought that he had made his conquest secure. So far the story runs on firmly and clearly. It is vivitl, consistent in itself, and held well within the limits of hu- man nature and experience. But, like Milton, Bunyan is now, by the exigencies of the situation, forced upon more perilous ground. He carries us into the presence of Shad- dai himself, at the time when the loss of Mansoul was re- ported in heaven. The king, his son, his high lords, his chief captains and nobles were all assembled to hear. There was universal grief, in which the king and his son shared, or rather seem- ed to share— for at once the drama of the Fall of Mankind becomes no better than a Mystery Play. " Shaddai and his son liad foreseen it all long before, and had provided for the relief of'Mansoul, though they told not everybody thereof — but because they would have a share in condolino- of the misery of Mansoul they did, and that at the rate oi the highest degree, bewail the losing of Mansoul "— " thus to show their love and compassion." Paradise Lost was published at the time that Bunyan wrote this passage. If he had not seen it, the coincidences of treatment are singularly curious. It is equally singular, if he had seen it, that Milton should not here at least have taught him to avoid making the Almighty into a stage actor. The Father and Son consult how " to do what they had designed before." They decide that at a certain time, which they preordain, the Son, " a sweet and comely per- son," .shall make a journey into the Universe,.and lay a foundation there for Mansoul's deliverance. Milton of- fends in the scene less than Bunyan ; but Milton cannot ■k il ./ i'2t; BUN VAN. [chap. I i persuade us tlmt it is one which should have been repre- sented by cither of tlieni. They sliould have left " plans of salvation" to eloquent orators in the pulpit. Though the day of deliverance by the method proposed was as yet far off, the war against Diabolus was to be commenced immediately. The Lord Chief Secretary was ordered to put in writing Shaddai's intentions, and cause them to be published.' Mansoul, it was announced, was to be put into a better condition than it was in before Diabolus took it. The report of the Council in Ilxjavcn was brought to Diabolus, who took his measures accordingly, Lord "Will be Will standing by him and executing all his directions. Mansoul was forbidden to read Shaddai's proclamation. Diabolus imposed a great oath on the townspeople never to desert him ; he believed that if they entered into a cove- nant of this kind Shaddai could not absolve them from it. They " swallowed the engagement as if it had been a sprat irt the mouth of a wlialc." Being now Diabolus's trusty children, he gave them leave " to do whatever their appe- tites prompted to do," They would thus involve them- selves in all kinds of wickedness, and Shaddai's son " being Holy " would be less likely to interest himself for them. When they had in this way put themselves, as Diabolus hoped, beyond reach of mercy, he informed them that Shaddai was raising an army to destroy the town. No quarter would be given, and unless they defended them- selves like men they would all be made slaves. Their spirit being roused, he armed them with the shield of im- belief, " calling into question the truth of the Word." He gave them a helmet of hope — " hope of doing well at last, whatever lives they m'ght lead ;" for a breastplate a heart ' The Scriptures. [chap, viir.j "THE HOLY WAR." 127 as hard as iron, "most necessary for all that hated Shad- dai ;" and another piece of most excellent armour, " a drunken and prayerless spirit that scorned to cry for mercy." Shaddai, on his side, liad also prepared his forces. He will not as yet send his son. The first expedition was to fail, and was meant to fail. The object was to try whether Mansoul would return to obedience. And vet Shaddai knew that it would not return to obedience. Bun- yan was too ambitious to explain the inexplicable. Fifty thousand warriors were collected, all chosen by Shaddai himself. There were four leaders — Captain Boanerires, Captain Conviction, Captain Judgment, and Captain Exe- cution—the martial saints, with whom Macaulay thinks Bunyan made acquaintance when he served, if serve he did, with Fairfax. The bearings on their banners were three black thunderbolts — the Book of the Law, wide open, with a flame of fire bursting from it; a burn- ing, fiery furnace; and a fruitless tree with an axe at its root. These emblems represent the teri'ors of Mount Sinai, the covenant of works which was not to prevail. The captains come to the walls of Mansoul, and sum- mon the town to surrender. Their words " beat against Eargate, but without force to break it open." The new officials answer the challenge with defiance. Lord In- credulity knows not by what right Shaddai invades their country. Lord Will be Will and Mr. Forget Good warn them to be off before they rouse Diabolus. The towns- people ring the bells and dance on the walls. Will be Will double-bars the gates. Bunyan's genius is at its best in scenes of this kind. " Old Mr. Prejudice, with sixty deaf men," is appointed to take charge of Eargate. At Eargate, too, are planted two guns, called Ilighmind and %i I I 4 A i , m. I 128 BUNYAX. [chap. .1 ti Ueady, "cast in the earth by Diabohis's head founder, whose name Avas Mr. Piiffup." The fighting- begins, but the covenant of works makes little progress. Shaddai's captains, when advancing on Mansoul, had fallen in with " three young fellows of promising appearance" who volunteered to go with them — "Mr. Tradition, Mr. Human Wisdom, and Mr. Man's In- vention." They were allowed to join, and were placed in positions of trust, the captains of the covenant being ap- parently wanting m discernment. They were taken pris- oners in the first skirmish, and immediately clianged sides and went over to Diabolus. More battles follow. The roof of the Lord Mayor's house is beaten in. The law is not wholly ineffectual. Six of the Aldermen, the grosser moral sins — Swearing, Stand to Lies, Drunkenness, Cheat- ing, and others — arc overcome and killed. Diabolus ixrows uneasy, and loses his sleep. Old Conscience begins to talk again. A party forms in the town in favour of surrender, and Mr. Parley is sent to t^argate to treat for terms. The spiritual sins — False Peace, Unbelief, Haughtiness, Athe- ism — are still unsubdued and vigorous. The conditions -ffcred are that Incredulity, Forget Good, and Will be Will shall retain their offices ; Mansoul shall be continued in all the liberties which it enjoys under Diabolus; and a further touch is added which shows how little Bunyan sympathised with modern notions of the beauty of self- government. No new law or officer shall have any power in Mansoul without the people's consent. Boanerges will agree to no conditions with rebels. In- credulity and Will be Will advise the people to stand by their rights, and refuse to submit to " unlimited " power. The war goes on, and Inciedulity is made Diabolus's uni- versal deputy. Conscience and Understanding, the old VIII.] "THE HOLY WAR." 129 Recorder and Mcayor, raise a mutiny, and there is a fight in the streets. Conscience is knocked down by a Dia- bolonian called Mr. Benuniminrj. Understanding- had a narrow escape from being shot. On the other hand, Mr. Mind, who had come over to the Conservative side, laid about bravely, tumbled old Mr. Prejudice into the dirt, and kicked him where he lay. Even Will be Will seemed to be wavering in his allegiance to Diabolus. "He smiled, and did not seem to take one side more than another." The rising, however, is put down — Understanding and Conscience are imprisoned, and Mansoul hardens its heart, chiefly " bemg in dread of slavery," and thinking liberty too fine a thing to be surrendered. Shaddai's four captains find that they can do no more. The covenant of works will not answer. They send home a petition, " by the hand of that good man Mr. Love to Mansoul," to beg that some new general may come to lead them. The preordained time has now arrived, and Em- manuel himself is to take the command. He, too, selects his captains — Credence and Good Hope, Charity, and In- nocence, and Patience ; and the captains have their squires, the counterparts of themselves — Promise and Expectation, Pitiful, Harmless, and Suffer Long. Emmanuel's armour shines like the sun. He has forty-four battering-rams and twenty-two slings — the sixty-six books of the Bible — each made of pure gold. He throws up mounds and trenches, and arms them Avith his rams, five of the largest beins- planted on Mount Hearken, over against Eargate. Ban- yan was too reverent to imitate the Mystery Plays, and introduce a Mount Calvary with the central sacrifice upon it. The sacrifice is supposed to have been already offered elsewhere. Emmanuel offers mercy to Mansoul, and when it is rejected he threatens judgment and terror. 1 il liiO BUN Y AN. [chap. )"• i i y >l Diabolus, being wiser than man, is made to know tliat his hour is approaehino-. lie jjjoes in person to Moutligate to protest and n-nionstrato. Ilo asks why Emmanuel is come to torment liim. Mansoiil has disowned Shaddai and sworn allegiance to himself, lie begs Emmanuel to leave him to rule his own subjects in peace. Emmanuel tells him "lie is a thief and a liar." " When," Emmanuel is made to say, " Mansoul sinned by heark"nino- to thy lie, I put in and became a surety to my Father, body for body, soul for soul, that I would make amends for Mansoul's transgressions, and my Father did accept thereof. So, when the time appointed was come, I gave body for body, soul for soul, life for life, blood for blood, and so redeemed my beloved Mansoul. My Father's law and justice, that were both concerned in the threaten- ing upon transgression, are both now satisfied, and very well content that Mansoul should be delivered." Even against its deliverers, Mansoul was defended by the original conditio.! of its constitution. There was no way into it but through the gates. Diabolus, feeling that Emmanuel still had diilicult'js before him, withdrew from the wall, and sent a messenger, Mr. Loth to Stoop, to offer alternative terms, to one or other of which he thought Emmanuel might consent. p]mmanuel might be titular sovereign of all Mansoul, if Diabolus might keep the ad- ministration of part of it. If this could not be, Diabolus requested to be allowed to reside in Mansoul as a private person. If Emmanuel insisted on his own personal ex- clusion, at least he expected that his friends and kin- dred migiit continue to live there, and that he himself might now and then write them letters, and send them presents and messages, "in remembrance of the merry times they had enjoyed together." Finally, he would like [CIIAP. vni.] "THE HOLY WAR." lyi liar. to bo consulted occasionally when any difficulties arose in Mansoul. It will be seen tliat in the end Mansoul was, in fact, left liable to coininunications from Diabolus very much of this .nd. Emmanuel's answer, however, is a pcremptorj No. Diabolus must take himself away, and no more must be heard of him. Seeing that there was no other resource, Diabolus resolves to tight it out. There is a great battle under the walls, with some losses on Emmanuers side, even Captain Conviction receiving three wounds in the mouth. The shots from the gold slings mow down whole ranks of Diabolonians. Mr. Love no Good and Mr. Ill Pause are wounded. Old Prejudice and Mr. Anything run away. Lord Will be AVill, who still fought for Diabolus, was never so hiuntcd in his life: "he was hurt in the leg, and limped." Diabolus, when the fight was over, came again to the gate with fresh proposals to Emmanuel. " I," he said, " will persuade Mansoul to receive thee for their Lord, and I know that they will do it the sooner when they under- stand that I am thy deputy. I will show them wherein they have erred, and that transgression stands in the way to life. I will show them the Holy Law to which they must conform, even that which they have broken. I will press upon them the necessity of a reformation according to thy law. At my own cost 1 v ill set up and maintain a sufficient ministry, besides lecturers, in M.insonl." This obviously means the Established Church. Unable to keep mankind directly in his own service, the devil offers to entangle them in the covenant of works, of which the Church of England was the representative. Emmanuel rebukes him for his guile and deceit. "I will govern Mansoul," he says, " by new laws, new officers, new mo- l;i 1 i 111 J 1 I If i ■■ . 132 BUNYAN. [chap. ti if tivcs, and new ways. I will pull down the town and build it again, and it shall be as though it had not been, and it shall be the glory of the whole universe." A second battle follows. Eargate is beaten in. The Prince's army enters and advances as far as the old Re- corder's house, where they knock and demand entrance. "The old gentleman, not fully knowing their design, liad kept Iiis gates sluit all the time of the fight. He as yet knew nothing of the great designs of Emmanuel, and could not tell what to think." The door is violently broken open, and the house is made Emu luuel's head- quarters. The townspeople, with Conscience and Under- standing at their head, petition that their lives may be spared; but Emmanuel gives no answer. Captain Boa- nerges and Captain Conviction carrying terror into all hearts. Diabolus, the cause of all the mischief, had re- treated into the castle.' He came out at last, and sur- rendered, and in dramatic fitness he clearly ought now to have been made away with in a complete manner. Un- fortunately, this could not be done. He was stripped of his armour, bound to Emmanuel's chariot-wheels, and thus turned out of Mansoul " into parched places in a salt land, where he might seek rest and find none." The salt land proved as insecure a prison for this embarrassing being as the pit where he was to have abode forever. Meanwhile, Mansoul bein<^' brought upon its knees, the inhabitants were summoned into the castle -yard, when Conscience, Understanding, and Will be Will were com- mitted to ward. They and the rest again prayed for mercy, but again without effect. Emmanuel was silent. They drew another petition, and asked Captain Conviction to present it for them. Captain Conviction declined to ' The heart. VI1I.J "TIIK HOLY WAK." laa be nn advocate for rebels, and advised tliem to send it by one of themselves, with a rope about his neck. Mr. De- sires Awake went with it. 'J'iie Prince took it from his hands, and wept as Desires Awake <,'ave it in. P^nmianuel bade liim c^o his way till the request could bo considered. The unhappy criminals knew not how to take the answer. Mr. Utiderstanding thoujjjlit it i)romised well, (.'onscience and Will be Will, borne down by shame for their sins, looked for nothing? but immediate death. They tried again. They threw thcmsebos f)n Emujaiiuers mercy. They drew up a confession of their horrible ini(|uities. This, at least, they wished to offer to him whether he would pity them or not. For a messenoer some of them thouijfht of ehoosincf one Old Good Deed. Conscience, however, said that would never do. Emmanuel would answer, "Is Old Good Deed yet alive in Mansoul? Then let Old Good Deed save it." Desires Awake went a<'ain with the rope on liis neck, as Captain Conviction rec- ommended. Mr. Wet Eyes went with him, wrinuinL' his hands. Emmanuel still held out no comfort; lie promised merely that in the camp the next morning he wo\ild give such an answer as should be to his glory. Nothing but the worst was now looked for. Mansoul passed the night in sackcloth an 1 ashes. When day broke, the prisoners dressed themselves in mourning, and were carried to the camp in chains, with ropes on their necks, beating their breasts. Prostrate before Emmanuel's throne, they re- peated their confession. They acknowledged that death and the bottomless pit would be no more than a just retri- bution for their crimes. As they excused nothinir and promised nothing, Emmanuel at once delivered them their pardons scaled with seven seals. He took off their ropes 11 i:m HUN VAN. [ciup. ami inoiiriiiiii;, clothi'fl them in shining garmciit«, and gave tlicm dia'ms and jewels. Lord Will be Will "swooned outright." Wlion lie re- covered, " the I'riiiec" enibraecd and kissed him. The hells in Mansuul were set ringing. IJontires blazed. Em- manuel reviewed his army ; and Maiisoul, ravished at the sight, prayed him to remain and hi their King for ever. He entered the city again in triumph, the p(;o[)le strewing boughs and flowers before liim. Tiie streets .-uid squares were rebuilt on a new model. Lord Will be Will, now regenerate, resumed the charge of the gates. The old Lord Mayor was reinstated. Mr. Knowledge was made Recorder, " not out of contempt for old ("onscience, who was by -and -bye to have another employment." J)iabo- lus's imnge was taken down and broken to pieces, and the iidiabitants of Mansoul were so happy that they sang of Enimamiel in their sleep. Justice, however, remained to be done on the hardened and impenitent. There were " perhaps necessities in the nature of things," as Bishop IJutler says, and an example could not be made of the principal ofTondcr. IJut liis servants atid old of- ficials were lurking in the lanes and alleys. They were apprehended, thrown into gaol, and brought to formal trial. Here we have Bunyan at his best. The scene in the court rises to tlic level of the famous trial of Faithful in Vanity Fair. The prisoners were Diabolus's Aldermen — Mr. Atheism, Mr. Incredulity, Mr. Lustings, Mr. F'orget Good, Mr. Hardheart, Mr. Falsepeace, and the rest. The proceedings were pre<'isely what Bunyan must have wit- nessed at a common English Assizes. The .Judges were the new Recorder and the new Mayor. Mr. Do-right was Town Clerk. A jury was erapanellcd in the usual way. X VIII.J "THE noLV WAK." 185 Mr. Knowall, Mr. Tclltruo, and Mr. llntflies were the prin- t'i[»;il wit Mosses. Atheism was first Lroiinlit to tlic hiw, hcinir fhaii^cd "with liaviiij,^ portiiiacioiisly and doltintfly taiit^Iit that tlioro was no Ciod." He |,I,.ain- ions and acts. Tiiey did not hold tliat there was any divine riglit in man to think what he pleased, and to say what lie thought. Banyan had suffered as a martyr ; but it was as a martyr for truth, not for general licence. The genuine Protestants never denied thui it was right to pro- hibit men from teaching lies, and to punish them if they disobeyed. The persecution of which they complained was the persecution of the honest man by the knave. All the prisoners were found guilty by a unanimous verdict. Even Mr. Moderate, who was one of the jury, thought a man nnist be wilfully blind who wished to spare them. They were sentenced to be executed the next day. Incredulity contrived to escape in the night. Search was made for hiin, but he w-as not to be found in Mansoul. He had fled beyond the walls, and had joined Diabolus near Hell Gate. The rest, we are told, were crucified — crucified by the hands of the men of Mansoul them- selves. They fought and strngglod at the place of exe- cution so violently that Shaddai's secretary was obliged to send assistance. But justice was done at last, and all the Diabolonians, except Incredulity, were thus made an end of. They were made an end of for a time only. Mansoul, by faith in Christ, and by the help of the Holy Spirit, had crucified all manner of sin in its members. It was faith that had now the victory. Unbelief had, unfortunately, escaped. It had left Mansoul for the time, and had gone to its master the devil. But unbeliof, being intellectual, had not been crucified with the sins of the flesh, and thus could come back, and undo the work which faith had ac- complished. I do not know how far this view approves itself to the more curious tlieologians. Unbelief itself is [chap. VIII.] "THE HOLY WAR." 189 said to be a product of the will ; but an allegory must not be cross-questioned too minutely. The cornucopia of spiritual blessings was now opened on Mansoul. All offences were fully and completely for- given. A Holy Law and Testament was bestowed on the people for their comfort and consolation, with a portion of the jrrace which dwelt in the hearts of Shaddai and Emmanuel themselves. They were to be allowed free access to Emmanuel's palace at all seasons, he himself undertaking to hear them and redress their grievances, and they were empowered and enjoined to destroy all Di- abolonians who might be found at any time within their precincts. These grants were embodied in a charter which was set up in gold letters on the castle door. Two ministers were appointed to carry on the government — one from Shad- dai's court ; the other a native of Mansoul. The first was Shaddai's Chief Secretary, the Holy Spirit, lie, if they were obedient and well-conducted, would be " ten times better to them than the whole world." But they were cautioned to be careful of their behaviour, for if they p*r'o.,od him he Avould turn against them, and the worst . < -ibf then be looked for. The second minister was the Old Recorder, Mr. Conscience, for whom, as was said, a new office had been provided. The address of Emmanuel to Conscience, in handing his commission to him, contains the essence of Bunyan's creed : "Thou must confine thyself to the teaching of moral virtues, to civil and natural duties. But thou must not attempt to presume to be a revealer of those liigh and su- pernatural mysteries that are kept close in the bosom of Shaddai, ray father. For those things knows no man ; nor can any reveal them but mv father's secretary only. . . . K 7 10 140 BUNYAN. [chap. ■ 1 't 1.1 all high and supernatural things thou must go to him for information and knowledge. Wherefore keep low and be humble ; and remeinber that the Diabolonians t})Ht kept not their first charge, but left their own standing, are now made prisoners in the pit. Be therefore con- tent with thy station. I have made thee my father's vice- gerent on earth in the things of which I have made men- tion before. Take thou power to teach them to Mansoul ; yea, to impose them with whips and chastisements if they shall not willingly hearken to do thy commandments. . . . And one thing more to my beloved Mr. Recorder, and to all the town of Mansoul. You must not dwell in nor stay upon anything of that which he liath in commission to teach you, as to your trust and expectation of the next world. Of the next world, I say ; for I purpose to give another to Mansoul when this is worn out. But for that you must wholly and solely have recourse to and make stay upon the doctrine of your teacher of the first order. Yea, Mr. Recorder liimself must not look for life from that which he himself revealeth. His dependence for that must be founded in the doctrine of the other preacher. Let Mr. Recorder also take heed that he receive not any doctrine or points of doctrine that are not communicated to him by his superior teacher, nor yet within the precincts of his own formal knowledge." Here, as a work of art. The Holy War should have its natural end. Mansoul had been created pure and happy. The devil plotted against it, took it, defiled it. The Lord of the town came to the rescue, drove the devil out, exe- cuted his officers and destroyed his works. Mansoul, ac- cording to Emmanuel's promise, was put into a better condition than that in which it was originally placed. New laws were drawn for it. New ministers were ap- [chap. nil.] 'THE HOLY WAR." 141 pointed to execute them. Vice had been destroyed. Un- belief had been driven away. The future lay serene and bright before it ; all trials and dangers being safely passed. Thus we have all the parts of a complete drama — the fair beginning, the perils, the struggles, and the final victory of good. At thl.i point, for purposes of art, the curtain ought to fall. For purposes of art — not, however, for purposes of truth ; for the drama of Mansoul was still incomplete, and will remain incomplete till man puts on another nat- ure or ceases altogether to be. Christianity might place him in a new relation to his Maker, and, according to Bunyan, might expel the devil out of his heart. But for practical purposes, as Mansoul too well knows, the devil is still in possession. At intervals — as in the first cen- turies of the Christian era, for a period in the middle ages, and again in Protestant countries for another period at the Reformation — mankind made noble efforts to drive him out, and make the law of God into reality. But he comes back again, and the world h again as it was. The vices again flourish which had been nailed to the Cross. The statesman finds it as little possible as ever to take moral right and justice for his rule in politics. The Evangelical preacher continues to confess and deplore the desperate wickedness of the human heart. The devil had been deposed, but his faithful subjects have restored Mm to his throne. The stone of Sisyphus has been brought to the brow of the hill only to rebound again to the bot- tom. The old battle has to be fought a second time, and, for all we can see, no closing victory will ever be in " this country of Universe." Bunyan knew this but too well. He tries to conceal it from himself by treating Mansoul alternately as the soul of a single individual from which H 142 BUNYAN. [CIIAP. I I if: the devil may bo so expelled as never dangerously to come back, or as the collective souls of the Christian world. But, let him mean which of the two he will, the overpowering fact remains that, from the point of view of his own theology, the great majority of mankind are the devil's servants through life, and are made over to him everlastingly when their lives are over; while the human race itself continues to follow its idle amusements and its sinful pleasures as if no Emmanuel had ever come from heaven to rescue it. Thus the situation is incomplete, and the artistic treatment necessarily unsatisfactory — nay, in a sense even worse than unsatisfactory — for the attention of the reader, being reawakened by the fresh and lively treat- ment of the subject, refuses to be satisfied with conven- tional explanatory commonplaces. His mind is puzzled ; his faith wavers in its dependence upon a Being who can permit His work to be spoilt, His power defied. His victo- ries even, when won, made useless. Thus we take up the continuation, of The Holy War with a certain weariness and expectation of disappoint- ment. The delivery of Mansoul has not been finished after all, and, for all that we can see, the struggle between Shaddai and Diabolus may go on to eternity. Emmanuel, before he withdraws his presence, warns the inhabitants that many Diabolonians are still lurking about the outside walls of the town.' The names are those in St. Paul's list — Fornication, Adultery, Murder, A.nger, Lasciviousness, Deceit, Evil Eye, P ikenness. Revelling, Idolatry, Witch- craft, Variance, En .ition. Wrath, Strife, Sedition, Heresy. If all tliese were still abroad, not much had been gained bv the crucifixion of the Aldermen. For the time, it was ' Tlic Flesh. [CIIAP. ■fill.] "TH'^. HOLY WAR." 148 true, they did not show themselves openly. Mansoul after the conquest was clothed in white linen, and was in a state of peace and glory. But the linen was speedily soiled again. Mr. Carnal Security became a great person in Man- soul. Tlic Chief Secretary's functions fell early into abey- ance, lie discovered the Recorder and Lord Will be Will at dinner in Mr. Carnal Security's parlour, and ceased to communicate with them. Mr. Godly Fear sounded an alarm, and Mr. Carnal Security's house was burnt by the mob ; but Mansoul's backslidings grew worse. It had its fits of repentance, and petitioned Emmanuel, but the mes- senger could have no admittance. The Lusts of the Flesh came out of their dens. They held a meeting in the room of Mr. Mischief, and wrote to invite Diabolus to return. Mr. Profane carried their letter to Hell Gate. Cerberus opened it, and a cry of joy ran through the prison. Beel- zebub, Lucifer, Apollyon, and the rest of the devils came crowding to imar the news. Dcadman's bell was rung. Diabolus addressed the assembly, putting them in hopes of recovering their prize. " Nor need you fear, he said, that if ever we get Mansoul again, we after that shall be cast out any more. It is the law of that Prince that now they own, that if we get them a second time they shall be ours forever." He returned a warm answer to his friend, " whi'li was subscribed as given at the Pit's n outh, by the joint consent of all the Princes of Darkness, by me, Di- abolus." The plan was to corrupt Mansoul's morals, and three devils of rank set ofE disguised to take service in the town, and make their way into the households of Mv. Mind, Mr. Godly Fear, and Lord Will be Will. Godly Fear discovered his mistake, and turned the devil out. The other two <_ jtablished themselves sviccessfully, and Mr. Profane was soon at Hell Gate again to report progress. 'i . 144 BUNYAN. [chap. i Ccrbcnis welcomed him with a *' St. Maiy, I am glad to see thee." Another council was hold in Pandemonium, and Diabolus was impatient to show himself again on the scene. Apollyon advised him not to be in a hurry. " Let our friends," he said, "draw Mansoul more and more into sin — there is nothing like sin to devour Mansoul ;" but Diabolus would not wait for so slow a process, and raised an army of ])oubters " from the land of Doubting, on the confines of llell Gate Hill." " Doubt," Bunyan always admitted, had been his own most dangerous enemy. Happily the towns -people became aware of the peril which threatened them. Mr. Prywell, a great lover of Mansoul, overheard some Diabolonians talking about it at a place called Vile Hill. lie carried his information to the Lord Mayor ; the Recorder rang the Alarm Bell ; Man- soul flew to penitence, held a day of fastmg and humilia- tion, and prayed to Shaddai. The Diabolonians were hunted out, and all that could be found were killed. So far as haste and alarm would permit, Mansoul mended its ways. But on came the Doubting army, led by Incredu- lity, who had escaped crucifixion — " none was truer to Diabolus than he " — on they came under their several cap- tains, Vocation Doubters, Grace Doubters, Salvation Doubt- ers, &c. ; figures now gone to shadow ; then the deadliest foes of every English Puritan soul. Mansoul appealed passionately to the Chief Secretary ; but the Chief Secre- tary " had been grieved," and would have nothing to say to it. The town legions went out to meet the invaders with good words, Prayer, and singing of Psalms. The Doubters replied with " horrible objections," which were frightfully effective. Lord Reason was wounded in the head, and the Lord Mayor in the eye ; Mr. Mind received a shot in the stomach, and Conscience was hit near the nil.] "THE HOLY WAR." 148 heart, ; btit the wounds were not mortal. Mansonl had the best of it in the first engagement. Terror was followed by boasting and self-confidence ; a night sally was attempt- ed — night being the time when the Doubters were strong- est. The sally failed, and the men of Mansoul were turned to rout. Diabolus's army attacked Eargate, stormed tho walls, forced their way into the town, and captured the whole of it except the castle. Then " Mansoul became a den of drag' ns, an emblem of Hell, a place of total dark- ness." " Mr. Conscience's wounds so festered that he could have no rest day or night." " Now a man might have walked for days together in Mansoul, and scarce have seen one in the town that looked like a religions man. Oh, the fearful state of Mansoul now !" " Now every corner swarmed with outlandish Doubters; Red Coats and Black Coats walked the town by clusters, and filled the liouses with hideous noises, lying stories, and blasphemous lan- guage against Shaddai and his Son." This is evidently meant for fashionable London in the time of Charles II. Bunyan was loyal to the King. He was no believer in moral regeneration through political rev- olution. But none the less he could see what was under his eyes, and he knew what to think of it. All was not lost, for the castle still held out. The only hope was in Emmanuel, and the garrison proposed to peti- tion again in spite of the ill-reception of their first mes- sengers. Godly Fear remmded them that no petition would be received which was not signed by the Lord Sec- retary, and that the Lord Secretary would sign nothing which he had not himself drawn up. The Lord Secretary, when appealed to in the proper manner, no longer refused his assistance. Captain Credence flew up to Shaddai's court with the simple words that Mansoul renounced all 41 I i I 146 BUNYAN. [chap. ^ ';! trust in its own stroni^tli iiiul relied iipon its Saviour. Tliis time its pmyer would be heanl. The devils, meanwhile, triumphant thous^ii they were, discovered that they could have no pernuuient victory un- less tliey could reduce the castle. "Doubters at a dis- tance," Beelzebub said, " are but like objections repelled by arguments. Can we but get them into the hold, and make them possessors of that, the day will be our own." Till- object was, therefore, to corrupt Mansoul at the heart. Then follows a very curious passage. Buriyan had still his eye on England, and had discerned the quarter from which her real danger would approach. Mansoul, the devil perceived, " was a market-town, much givfui to com- merce." " It would be possible to dispose of som '. of the devil's wares there." Th. people would be filled full, and made rich, and would forget Emmanuel. " Mansoul," they said, "shall be so cumbered with .ibundancc that thoy shall be forced to make their castle a warehouse." Wealth once made the first object of existence, " Diabolus's gang will have easy entrance, and the castle will be our own." Political economy was still sleeping in the womb of futurity. Diabolus was unable to hasten its birth, and an experiment which Bunyan thought would certainly have succeeded was not to be tried. The Beus ex Marliind ap- peared with its flaming sword. The Doubting army was cut to pieces, mid Mansoul was saved. Again, however, the work was imperfectly done. Diabolus, like the bad genius in the fairy talc, survived for fresh mischief. Diab- olus flew t)ff again to Hell Gate, and was soon ai the head of a new host; part composed of fugitive Doubters whom he rallied, and part of a new set of enemies called Blood- men, by whom wc are to understand persecutors, " a peo- ple from a land that lay under the Dog Star." " Captain 1., i \x ilL f\ VIII. J "TlIK HOLY WAR." 147 Pope " was chief of the Bloodmcn. His escutcheon " was the stake, the tlatne, mid good men in it." The Blood men liad done Diabohis wonderful service in time past. " Once they liad forced Fhnnianuel out of the Kinwn sorrows and trials, his own failures or success* o.i'i in own end. He wins the j^ame, or he loses it. The account is wound up, and the curtain falls upon him. Here I^imyan had a material as excellent in itself as it was exactly suited to his peculiar genius; and his treatment of the subject from his own point of view — that of English Protestant Christianity- is unequalled, and never will be equalled. I may say never, for in this world of change the point of view alters fast, and never contiiuies in one stay. As we are swept along the stream of time, lights and shadows shift their places, mountain plateaus turn to sharp peaks, mountain ranges dissolve into vapour. The river which has been gliding deep and slow along the plain, leaps suddenly over a precipice and plunges foaming down a sunless gorge. \ \m Ml 160 BUNYAN. [chap. In the midst of changing circumstances the central ques- tion remains the same— What am I ? what is this world, in which I appear and disappear like a bubble ? who made me ? and what am I to do ? Some answer or other the mind of man demands and insists on receiving. Theolo- gian or poet offers, at long intervals, explanations which arc accepted as credible for a time. They wear out, and another follows, and then another. Banyan's answer has served average English men and women for two hundred years, but no human being with Bunyan's intellect and Bunyan's sincerity can again use similar language; and The Pih/rhii's Progress is and will remain unique of its liiiid — an imperishable monument of the form in which the problem presented itself to a person of singular truth- fulness, simplicity, and piety, who, after many struggles, accepted the Puritan creed as the adequate solution of it. It was composed exactly at the time when it was possible for such a book to come into being — the close of the period when the Puritan formula was a real belief, and was about to change from a living principle into an intel- lectual opinion. So long as a religion is fully alive, men do not talk about it or make allegories about it. They assume its truth as out of reach of question, and they simply obey its precepts as they obey the law of the land. It becomes a subject of art and discourse only when men are unconsciously ceasing to believe, and therefore the more vehemently think that they believe, and repudiate with indignation the suggestion that doubt has found its way into them. After this, religion no longer governs their lives. It governs only the language in which they express themselves, and they preserve it eagerly, in the shape of elaborate observances or in the agreeable forms of art and literature. .X.] " THE riL(iRIM'S PROGRESS." 161 The Pilgrim'' s Progress was written before The Holy War, wliilc ]>unyan was still in prison at Bedford, and was but half conscious of the gifts which he possessed. It WHS written for his own entertainment, and therefore with- out the tlioiight— so fatal in its effects and so hard to be resisted— of what the world would say about it. It was written in compulsory quiet, when lie was comparatively unexcited by the effort of perpetual preacliing, and the shapes of things could present themselves to him as they really were, undistorted by theological narrowness. It is the same story which he has told of himself in Grace Abounding, thrown out into an objective form. He tells us himself, in a metrical introduction, the cir- cumstances under which it was composed : — "When at the first I took my pen in hand, Thus for to write, I did not understand That I at all should niaitleties, ready *'to talk of things heavenly • jfji eaiUiiy, things moral or things evan- gelical, tilings sacred or things profane, things past or things tn oomo, things foreign or things at home, things essential or things circumstantial, provided that all be done to our profit." This gentleman would 1 • . ...nvc.i in Fui'hful, who was awed by surh a rush of volubility. Christian has seen him before, knows him well, and can describe him. " Ho is the son of one Saywell. He dwelt in Prating Row. lie is for any company and for any talk. As he talks now with you, so will he talk when on the ale-bench. The more drink he hath in his crown, the more of these things he hath in his mouth. Kcligion hath no place in his heart, (»r homo, or conversation ; all that he hath lieth in his tongue, and his religion i; to mf.ke a noise therewith." The elect, though they have ceased to be of the Tr,,,:-ldj are still in the world. They are still part of the general community of mankind, and share, whether they like it or not, in the ordinary activities of iife. Faithful and Chris- tian have left the City of Destruction. They have shaken off from themselves all liking for idle pleasures. They nevertheless find themselves in theii 'ourney at Vanity Fair, " a fair set up by Beelze ub 6000 years ago." Trade of all sorts \ iit on at Vani> , Fair, an people of all sorts were collected there : cheats, fools, asses, knaves, and IX.] "THE riLGKIM'rt rROGllESS." 101 roe pilgrims appear on the scene as the Apostles appeared at Antioch and Rome, to tell the people that there were things in the world of more consequence than money and pleasure. The better sort listen. Public oi)inion in general calls them fools and Bedlamites. The fair becomes excited, disturbances arc feared, ami the authorities send to make inquiries. Authorities naturally disapprove of novelties; and Christian and Faithful are arrested, beaten, and put in the cage. Tlair friends insist that they have done no harm, that they are inr cut strangers teaching only what will make men better instead of worse. A riot follows. The authorities determine to make an example of them, and tlic result is the ever-memorable trial of the two pil- grims. They are brought in irons before my Lord Hate- good, charged with " disturbing the trade of the town, creating divisions, and making converts to their opinions in contempt of the law of the Prince." Faithful begins with an admission which would have made it ditiicult for Ilategood to lot him off, for he says t t the Prince they talked of, being Beel, 'bub, the enemy (..i le Lord, he defied him and all his angels. Three wit- nesses ore then called: Envy, Superstition, and Pick- thank. Envy says that Faithful regards neither prince nor peo- r m ilil I mi! 162 BUNVAN. [riiAP. plo, but docs all liP onn to possess men with lay- ful quaintncss. He was onco fjoing somewhere dis^aiiscd as a watfijoner. lie was overtaken by n const.it'le who had a warrant arrest him. The constable askoi if he knew tliat uevil of How IJimyan. " Kn^ u . " Hnn- yan said. "You might o;i!! him a devil if y. kn. '•, him as well as I once diil." A Cambridi^e student was trying to show him what a divine liiinpj reason was — "reason, the chief Lflory of man. which distinguished him from a beast," ttc., ttc. Banyan growled out: "vSiu di-tin w tfaaM&3>i,ja !! M tnucliod for tho kin^^'a ovil. Tho touch wasincH'i-ctunl. IVrlmps, as IJoswnll sii;,';^ostcil, ho ought to liiivo heen i)i(.'S('r;tt'(l to the genuine liciiH of tho Stuaita in li'onie. I)if^('ii'^e and superstition had thus pfood by liia ciadle, and they never quitted liim during life. Tho de- mon of )iy|)ochondria was always lying in wait fur hiui, and could bo exorcised for a time only by hard wide or social excitement. Of this avo shall hear enough ; but it may be as w(.'ll to sum up at once some of tho physical characteiistics which marked him through life and greatly influ< need his career. Tho disease had scarred and disfigured features other- wise regular and always impressive. It had seriously injured his eyes, entirely destroying, it seems, tho sight of one. Ho could not, it is said, distinguish a friend's face half a yard olf, and pictures were to him nn aninglesH patches, in -which ho could never eeo the resemblance to their objects. Tho statement is perhaps exaggerated ; for he could see enough to condemn a portrait of himself. He expressed some annoyance when Reynolds had painted him with a pen held close to his eye ; and protested that he would not bo handed down to posterity as " blinking Sam." It seems that habits of minute attention atoned in some degree for this natural defect. Eos well tells us how Johnson onco corrected him as to the precise shape of a mountain ; and Mrs. Thrulo says that he was a close and exacting critic of ladies* dress, even to tho accidental position of a riband. Ho could even lay down eesthctical canons upon such matters. Ho reproved her for wearing a link dress as unsuitable to a " little creature." " What," he a^Ked, " have not all insects gny rolours { " His inscn- [CHAf. i.] CHILDHOOD AND EARLY LIFE. nibility to music was oven more pronouncod than Ins dul* ness of sight. On hoarin;^» it said, in prai.so of a nnisimil porfonuancci, that it was in any caso dillicult, his leuliiig corainunt was, " I wish it had Imcn iiiipoasiblo !" Tho (lUocT convulsions by which ho aniazod all bohuldcrs wore probably connuctod with his disease, though he and Ilcynolds iv ribod them aiinply to habit. Wiion entering a doorway with his blind companion, Miss Willlania, he would suddenly desert her on the step in or«ler to "whirl and twist about" in strange gebticulations. Tiio poribrni- liiiio partook of tho nature of a superstitious ceremonial. He would stop in a street or tho middle of a room to go througli it correctly. Once ho collected a laughing mob in Twickenham meadows by liis antics ; his hands imitat- ing tho motions of a jockey riding at full speed and his feet twisting in and out to make heels and toes touch alti r- nately. lie presently sat down and took out a OmtittM De Veritate, over which he "seesawed" so vio'^ntly th;a the mob ran back to see what was the matter. Onra in Buch a tit ho suddeidy twisted off tho shoo of a lady who Bat by him. Sometimes ho seemed to bo obeying some hidden impulse, Avhich commanded him to touch every post in a street or tread on the centre of every paving-stone, and would return if his task had not been accurately performed. In spite of such oddities, ho was not only possessed of physical power corresponding to his great height and massive stature, but was something of a proficient at ath- letic exercises. lie was conversant with tlio theory, at least, of boxing ; a knowledge probably acquired from an undo who kept the ring at Smithfield for a year, and was never beaten in boxing or wrestling. His constitutional fearlessness would have made him a formidu jIo antagonist \\ SAMUEL JOHNSON. LCHiF Hawkins describes the oak staff, six foot in length and in- creasing from one to three inches in diameter, Avhicli lay ready to his hand wlien ho expected an attack from ^lacpherson of Ossian celebrity. Once he is said to havo taken up a chair at the tlieatre upon wliich a man had seated himself during his temporary absence, and to have tossed it and its occupant bodily into the pit. He would swim into pools said to be dangerous, beat huge dogs into peace, climb trees, and even run races and jump gates. Once at least he went out foxhunting, and though he despised the amusement, was deeply touched by the com])limentary assertion that he rode as well as the most illiterate fellow in England. Perhaps the most whimsical of his perform- ances was when, in his fifty-fifth year, he went to the top of a high hill with his friend Langton. *' I have not had a roll for a long time," said the great lexicographer sud- denly, and, after deliberately emptying his pockets, ho kid himself parallel to the edge of the hill, and descended, turning over and over till he came to the bottom. "We may believe, as Mrs. Thrale remarks upon his jumping over a stool to show that he was not tired by his hunting, that his performances in this kind Avere so strange and uncouth that a fear for the safety of his bones quenched the spectator's tendency to laugh. In such a strange case Avas imprisoned one of the most vigorous intellects of the time. Vast strength hampered by clumsiness and associated with grievous disease, deep and massive powers of feeling limited by narrow though acute perceptions, were characteristic both of soul and body. These peculiarities were manifested from his early infancy. I\riss Seward, a typical specimen of the ])vo- vincial precieitse, attempted to trace them in an epitaph which he was said to have written at the age of three. Jl [CHiF I.] CHILDJOOD AND EARLY LIFE. Here lies pood master duck Whom Samuel Johnson trod on j If it had lived, it had been good luck, For then wo had had an odd one. The verses, however, wcro really mndo hy hia father, who passed them cif as the child's, and illustrate nothing but the paternal vanity. In fact the hoy was regarded as something of an infant prodigy. His great powers of memory, characteristic of a mind singularly retentive of all impressions, were early developed. He seemed to learn by intuition. Indolence, as in his after life, alternated with brief efibrts of strenuous exertion. His want of si<:rht prevented him from sharing in the ordinary childish sports ; and one of his great pleasures Avas in reading old romances — a taste which he retained through life. Boys of this temperament are generally despised by their fellows ; but Johnson seems to have had tlie power of enforcing the respect of his companions. Three of the lads used to come for him in the morning and carry him in triumph to school, seated upon the shoulders of one and supported on each side by his companions. After learning to read at a dame-school, and from a certain Tom Brown, of whom it is only recorded tliat he published a spelling-book and dedicated it to the Universe, young Samuel was sent to the Lichfield Grammar School, and was afterwards, for a short time, apparently in the character of pupil-toachcr, at the school of Stourbridge, in Worcastershire. A good deal of Latin was " wliipped into him," and though he complained of the excessive severity of two of his teachers, he was always a believer in the virtues of the rod. A child, he said, who is flogged, " gets his task, and there's an end on't ; whereas by oxciring emulation and comparisons of superiority, you lay the II' 6 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [chap. ';> I .' * '1 ' foundations of lasting mischief; you make brothers and sisters hate each other." In practice, indeed, this stern disciplinarian seems to have been specially indulgent to children. The memory of his own sorroAvs made him value their happiness, and he rejoiced greatly when he at last persuaded a schoolmaster to remit the old-fashioned holiday-task. Johnson left school at sixteen and spent two years at home, probably in learning his father's business. Tliis seems to have been the chief peri )d of his studies. Long afterwards he said tliat he knew abnost as much at eighteen as ho did at the age of fifty-three — the date of the remark. His father's shop would give him many opportunities, and he devoured what came in his way with the undiscrinii- nating eagerness of a young student. His intellectual resembled his physical appetite. He gorged books. He tore the hearts out of them, but did not study systemati- cally. Do you read books through ] he asked indignantly of some one Avho expected from him such supererogatory labour. His memory enabled him to accumulate great stores of a desultory and unsystematic knowledge. Some- how he became a fine Latin scholar, though never fu\st- rate as a Grecian. The direction of his studies was partly determined by the discovery of a folio of Petrarch, lying on a shelf where he was looking for apples ; and one of his earliest literary plans, never carried out, was an edition of Politian, with a history of Latin poetry from the time of Petrarch. When he went to the University at the end of this period, ho was in possession of a very unusual amount of reading. Meanwhile ho was beginning to feel the pressure of poverty. His father's aii'airs were probably getting into disorder. Ona anecdote — it is one which it is diflicult [chap. !•] CHILDHOOD AND EARLY LIFE. lers and lis stern ilgcnt to ado hini len he at iasliioned years at is. This 3. Long eighteen B remark, ities, and idiscrinii- telleetual oks. lie ystemati- Jignaiilly erogatory kte great 0. Some- 3ver first- vas partly ,rch, lying one of liis edition of be time of ;ho end of al amount rcssure of tting into B ditVicult to read •without emotion — refers to this period. Man^ years after^Yards, Johnson, worn by disease and the hard struggle of life, was staying at Lichfield, where a few old friends still survived, but in which every street must have revived the ni( •nories of the many who had long since gone over to I ■; majority. He was missed one morning at breakfast, mA did not return till supper-time. Then he told how his time had been passed. On that day lifty years before, his father, confined by illness, had begged him to take his place to sell books at a stall at Uttoxeter. Pride made him refuse. " To do away with the sin of this dis- obedience, I this day went u a post-chaise to Uttoxeter, and going into the market at the time of high business, uncovered my head and stood Avith it bare an hour before the stall which my father had formerly used, exposed to the sneers of the standers-by and the inclemency of the weather; a penance by which I trust I have propitiated Heaven for this only instance, I believe, of contumacy to my father." If the anecdote illustrates the touch of superstition in Johnson's mind, it reveals too that sacred depth of tenderness which ennobled his character. No repentance can ever wipe out the past or make it be as though it had not been ; but the remorse of a fine cha- racter may be transmuted into a permanent source of nobler views of life and the world. There are difficulties in determining the circumstances and duration of Johnson's stay at Oxford. He began residence at Pembroke College in 1728. It seems pro- bable that he received some assistance from a gentle- man whoso son took him as companion, and from the clergy of Lichfield, to whom his father Avas known, and Avho were uAvare of the son's talents. Possibly hiB college assisted him duiing part of the time. It li •i:' : !« h \ 8 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [chap. is certain that lie left witliout taking a degree, though ho probably resided for nearly three years. It is certain, also, that his father's bankruptcy made hi» stay difficult, and that the period must have been one of trial. The effect of the Oxford residence upon Johnson's mind was characteristic. The lad already suffered from the attacks of melancholy, Avhich sometimes drove him to the borders of insanity. At Oxford, Law's Serious Call gave him the strong religious impressions which remained through life. But ho docs not si.i m to have been regarded iis a gloomy or a religious youth by his contemporaries. WliL'u told in after years that he had been described as a " gay and frolicsome fellow," he replied, " Ah ! sir, I was mad and violent. It was bitterness which they mistook for frolic. I was miserably poor, and I thought to fight my way by my literature and my wit ; so I di^^rcgarded all power and all authority." Though a hearty supporter of authority in princiijle, Johnson was distinguished through life by the ^.trongest spirit of personal indepen- dence and self-respect. He held, too, the sound doctrine, deplored by his respectable biographer HaAvkins, that the scholar's life, like the Christian's, levelled all distinctions of rank. When an officious benefactor put a pair of new shoes at his door, he threw them aAvay with indignation. He seems to have treated his tutors with a contempt which Boswell politely attributed to " great fortitude of mind," but Johnson himself set down as "stark insensibility." The life cf a poor student is not, one may fear, even yet exempt from much bitterness, and in those days the position was far more servi'o than at present. The ser- vitors and sizars had much to bear from richer companions. A. proud melancholy lad, conscious of great powers, had I ~m I.] CHILDHOOD AND EARLY LIFE. to meet with hard rebuffs, and tried to mt,et them by returning scorn for scorn. Such distresses, however, did not shalce Johnson'e rooted Toryism. He fully imbibed, if ho did not already shore, the strongest prejudices of the place, and his misery never produced a revolt against the system, though it may have fostered insolence to individuals. Three of the most eminent men with whom Johnson came in contact in later life, had also been students at Oxford. Wesley, his senioi by six years, was a fellow of Lincoln whi^^t Johnson Avas an undergraduate,, and was learning at Oxford the neces- sity of rousing his countrymen from the religious lethargy into which they had sunk. "Have not pride and haughtiness of spirit, impatience, and peevishness, sloth and indolence, gluttony and sensuality, and even a pro- verbial uselessness been objected to us, perhaps not always by our enemies nor wholly without ground 1 " So said Wesley, preaching before the University of Oxford in 1744, and the words in his mouth imply more than the preacher's formality. Adam Smith, Johnson's junior by fourteen years, was so impressed by the utter indifference of Oxford authorities to their duties, as to find in it an admirable illustration of the consequences of the neglect of the true principles of supply and demand implied in the endow- ment of learning. Gibbon, his junior by twenty-eight years, passed at Oxford the " most idle and unprofitable " months of his whole life ; and was, he said, as willing to disclaim the university for a mother, as she could be to renounce him for a son. Oxford, as judged by these men, was remarhable as an illustration of the spiritual and intellectual decadence of a body which at other times hag been a centre of great movements of thought. Johnson, though his experience was rougher than any of the three. i^l L^.ijjjia w iBiJ;:x.i - 10 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [CHA» : loved Oxford as though she had not been a harsh step, mother to his youtli. Sir, ho said fondly of lua college, " wo are a nest of singing-birds." j\Iost of the strains are now pretty well forgotten, and some of them must at all times have been such as we scarcely associate witli the nightingale. Johnson, however, cherished his coUcgo friendships, delighted in paying visits to his old university, and was deeply touched by the academical honouis by which Oxford long afterwards recognized an eminence scarcely fufterec^ by its protection. Far from sharing the doctrines of Adam Smitli, he only regretted that the univeisities were not richer, and expressed a desire which will 1)0 understood by advocates of the " endowment of research," that there were many places of a thousand a year at Oxford. On leaving the Universitj^, in 1731, the world was all before him. His fatlier died in the end of the year, and Johnson's whole immediate inheritance was twenty pounds. Where Avas he to turn for daily bread 1 Even in those days, most gates were barred with gold and opened but to golden keys. The greatest chance for a poor man was probably through the Church. The career of Warburton, who rosa from a similar position to a bishopric might have been rivalled by Johnson, and his connexions with Lichfiidd might, one would suppose, have helped him to a start. It would be easy to speculate upon causes which might have hindered such a career. In later life, he more than once refused to take orders upon the promise of a living. Johnson, as we know him, was a man of the world ; though a religious man of the world. Ho represents the secular rather than the ecclesiastical type. 8o fir as his mode of teaching goes, he is rather a disciple of Socrates than of St. Paul or "Wceley. According to iO CHILDHOOD AND EARLY LIFE. ir him, a " tavern-chair " Avas " tlie throne of human felicity," and supplied a better arena than the pulpit for tlie utterance of his message to mankind. And, though his external circumstances doubtless determined hia metliod, there was much in his character which made it congenial. Johnson's religious emotions were such as to make habitual reserve almost a sanitary necessity. They were deeply coloured by his constitutional melancholy. Fear of death and hell were prominent in his personal creed. To trade upon his feelings like a cliarlatan would have been abhorrent to his masculine character ; and to give them fall and frequent utterance like a genuine teacher of mankind would have been to imperil his sanity. If he had gone through tlie excitement of a INfethodist conversion, he would probably have ended his days in a madhouse. Such considerations, however, were not, one may guess, distinctly present to Johnson himself; and the olfer of a college fellowship or of private patronage miglit probably have altered his career. He might have become a learned recluse or a struggling Parson Adams. College fellowships were less open to talent then than now, and patrons were never too propitious to the uncouth giant, who had to force his way by sheer labour, and figlit for his own hand. Ac- cordingly, the young scholar tried to coin his brains into money by the most depressing and least hopeful of employ- ments. By bt\ioming an usher in a school, he could at least turn his talents to account with little delay, and that was the most pressing consideration. Ey one schoolmaster he was rejected on the ground that his infirmities would excite the ridicule of the boys. Under another he passed some months of " complicated misery," and could never think of the school without horror and aversion. Finding this situation intolerable, lie settled in Birmingham, in 1733w B Vi5 ill f ' ! ; , 1 ■ , i i t ' ^ 1 1 ra- SAl^IUEL JOHNSON. {cakv to be noar nn old sclioolfLllow, named Hector, who was apparently beginning to practise as a surgeon. Jolinson Hcenis to have liad some acquaintances among the com- fortable families in the neighbourhood; but his means of living are obscure. Some small literary work came in hia way. He contributed essays to a local jjaper, and translated a ljo(jk of Travels in Abyssinia. For tl'.is, his first publica- tion, he received live guineas. In 1734- ho made certain overtures to Cave, a London jniblisher, of the result of which I shall have to speak presently. For the present it is pretty clear that the great problem of self-su^iport had been very inadequately solved. Having no money and no prospects, Johnson naturally married. The attractions of the lady were not very manifest to others than her husband. She was the widow of a Birininghara mtjrcer named Porter. Her ago at the time (173,'>) of the second marriage was forty-eight, the bridegroom being not quite twenty-six. Tlie bio- grapher's eye was not fixed upon Johnson till after his wife's death, and we have little in the way of autlicntic description of her person and character. Garrick, who had known her, said that s^^e was very fat, with cheeks coloured both by paint and cordials, flimsy and fantastic in dress and affected in her manners. She is said to have treated her husband with some contempt, adopting the airs of an antiquated beauty, which he returned by elaborate deference. Garrick used his wonderful powers of mimicry to make fun of the uncouth caresses of the husband, and the courtly Beauclerc used to provoke the smiles of his audience by repeating Johnson's assertion that " it was a love-match on both sides," One incident of the wedding-day was ominous. As the neAvlj-married couple rode back from church, Mrs. Johnson showed beJ I] CHILDHOOD AND EARLY LIFE. 13 spirit by reproaching her husband for riding too fast, and t' ' for higging behind, llesolvcd " not to be made the si.^vo of caprice," ho pushed on briskly till he was fairly out of sight. When she rejoined him, as he, of course, took care that she should soon do, she was in tears. Mrs. Johnson apparently knew how to regain supremacy ; but, at any rate, Johnson loved her devotedly during life, and cluno- to her memorv during a widowhood of more than thirty years, as fondly as if they had been the most pattern hero and heroine of romantic fiction. Whatever Mrs. Johnson's charms, she seems to have been a woman of good sense and some literary judgment. Johnson's grotesque appearance did not prevent her frou\ saying to her daughter on their first introduction, " This is the most sensible man I ever met." Her praises were, we may believe, sweeter to him than those of the severest critics, or the most fervent of personal flatterers. Like all good men, Johnson loved good women, and liked to have on hand a flirtation or two, as warm as might be within the bounds of due decorum. But nothing affected his fidelity to his Letty or displaced her image in his mind. He remembered her in many solemn prayers, and such words .IS " this was dear Letty's book :" or, " this was a prayer which dear Letty was accustomed to say," were found written by him in many of her books of devotion. Mrs. Johnson had one other recommendation — a fortune, namely, of £800 — little enough, even then, as a provision for the support of the married pair, but enough to help Johnson to make a fresh start. In 1V36, there appeared an advertisement in the Gentleman's Magazine. "At Edial, near Lichfield, in Staffordshire, young gentlemen arc boarded and taught the Latin and Greek languages by Samuel Johnson," If, as seems probable, Mrs. Johnson's i&.M.. ! ' )< l > «*J -Il^i--- . <» ■ .»->a-^ J- 14 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [CHAr, li i money aupplicd tho funda for this vculuro, it was an unluckj- speculation. Jolinson was not fitted to bo a pedagogue. Success in that proit'ssion implies skill in tho management of pupils, but purhaps stiJl nioro decidedly in tho management of parents. Johnson had little qualifications in either way. As a teacher ho would probably have been alternately despotic and over-indulgent ; and, on tbo other hand, at a single glance tho rough Dominie Sampson would bo enough to frighten the ordinary parent off his promises. Very few pui)ilscame, and they soemto have profited little, if a story as told of two of his pupils refers to this time. After somo months of instruction in English history, ho asked them who had destroyed the monasteries ] One of them gave no answer ; the other replied " Jesus Christ." Johnson, how- ever, could boast of one eminent pupil in David Garrick, tiiough, by Garrick's account, his master was of little service except as affording an excellent mark for his early powers of ridicule. The school, or " academy," failed after a year and a half ; and Johnson, once more at a loss for employment, resolved to try the great experiment, made so often and so often unsuccessfully. He left Lichfield to seek his fortune in I^ondon. Gavrick accompanied liim, and the two brought a common letter of introduction to the master of an academy from Gilbert Walmsley, registrar of the Pre- rogative Court in Lichfield. Long after\vards Johnson took an opportunity in the Lives of the Poets, of expressing his warm regard for tho memory of his early friend, to whom he had been recommended by a community of literary tastes, in spite of party differences and great inequality of age. Walmsley says in bis letter, that " one Johnson " is about to accompany Garrick to London, in order to tiy his fate with a tragedy and get himself em- ••] CniLDUOOD AND EARLY LIFE. Ifi ployed in translation. Johnson, lio adds, " is a vory good scholar and poot, and I havo great hopes will turn out a iino tragedy writer." The letter ia dated March 2nd, 1737. Before recording what ia \nown of his early career thus started, it will l)e well to udco a glance at tho general condition of the pro t'tsaion of LiteK>^"ice in England it thia period. Hi • one 10 «AMUi&L JOHNSON. (oaA) CHAPTER n. LITEiUBY CAHEEU. ,Al "No man but a blockhc, !," said Johnson, "over vnott except for money." The doctrine is, of course, perfectly ontruf'cous, and specially calculated to shock people who like to keep it for their private use, instead of proclaiming it in public. IJut it is a ^ood expression of that huge con- tempt for the foppery of high-flown sentiment which, as is not uncommon with Johnson, passes into something which wovdd bo cynical if it were not half-humorous. In this case it implies also the contempt of the professional for liie amateur. Johnson despised gentlemen who dabbled in his craft, as a man whose life is devoted to music or painting despises the ladies and gentlemen who treai those arts as fashionable accomplishments. An author was, according to him, a man who turned out books as a brick- layer turns out houses or a tailor coats. So long as he supplied a good article and got a fai'- price, ho was a fool to grumlde, and a humbug to afreet loftier motives. Johnson was not the first professional author, in this sense, but perhaps the first man who made the profession respect- able. The principal habitat of authors, in his age, was Grub Street— a region which, in later years, has ceased tc be ashamed of itself, and has adopted the more pretentioot n.] LITERARY CAREEB. 17 name TJohomfa. Tho original Grub Stroot, it h ruM, firnt becamo ii,ssoci;ito(l with u'lthorsliip during tho incrcano of pamphlet literature, produood by tho civil wars. Fox, tho niartyrologist, was one of ita original inh"? Uants. Another of its lioroos was a itain Islr. Wt^by, r.f v ■;()m tho sold record is, tliat ho " lived tliero forty years without being seen .f any." In laet, it was a region of holes and corners, calculatcnl to illustrate that great iidvantago of London life, wliich a friend '>f Bosweli ., dcscrilied by say- ing, that a man could there be always " close to Jiis bur- row." Tho " burrow " wliich receive 1 tho luckless wiglit, was indeed no pleasant refuge. Since pt)or Green, in tho earliest generation of dramatists, bought his " groat'sworth of wit with a million of repentance," too many of his brt;tliien had trodden tho path which led to hopeless misery or death in a tavern brawl. The hit^tory of men who had to support themselves by their pons, is a record of almost universal gloom. Tho names of Spenser, of Butler, and of Otway, are enough to remind us that even warm contemporary recognition was not enough to raise an author abovo the fear of dying in want of necessaries Tho two great dictators of literature, Een Jonson in the earlier and Dry den in tho later i)art of tho century, only kept their heads above water by help of tho laureate's i)it- tance, though reckless imprudence, encouraged by the precarious life, was the cause of much of their sull'erings. Patronage gave but a ^tful resource, and the author could hope at most but an occasional crust, flung to him from better provided tables. In the happy days of Queen Anne, it is true, there had been a gleam of prosperity. :Many authors, Addison, Congreve, Swift, and others of less name, had won by their pens not only temporary profits but permanent '1. li .y t^it 18 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [CUAP. places. The class -winch came into power at the Eevolu- tion was willing for a time, to share some of the public patronage with men distinguished for intellectual emi- nence. Patronage was liberal when the funds came out of other men's pockets. Eut, as the system of party government developed, it soon became evident that this involved a waste of power. There were enough political partisans to absorb all the comfortable sinecures to be had ; and such money as was still spent upon literature, was given in return for services equally degrading to giver and receiver. Nor did the patronage of literature reach the poor inhabitants of Grub Street. Addison's poetical power might suggest or justify the gift of a place from his elegant friends ; but a man like De Foe, who really looked to his pen for great part of his daily subsistence, was below the region of such prizes, and was obliged in later years not only to Avrite inferior books for money, but to sell himself and act as a spy upon his fellows. One great man, it is true, made an independence by literature. Pope received some £8000 for his translation of Homer, by the then popular mode of subscription — a kind of compromise between the systems of patronage and public support. But his success caused little pleasure in Grub Street. No love was lost between the poet and the dwellers in this dismal region. Pope was its deadliest enemy, and carried on an in- ternecine warfare Avith its inmates, which has enriched our language with a great satire, but Avhich wasted his powers ujjon low objects, and tempted him into disgraceful artitices. The life of tlie unfortunate victims, pilloried in the Dun- clad and accused of the unpardonable sins of poverty and dependence, was too often or 3 which might have extorted fympathy even from a thin-skinned poet and critic. Illustrations of the manners and customs of that Grub [CUAF, II.J LITERARY CAREER. 19 Street of \\ hicU Johnson was to become an inmate are only too abundant. The best writers of the day could tell of hardships endured in that dismal region. Eiohardson went on the sound principle of keeping his shop t\ii\t his shop might keep liira. But the other great novelists of the century have painted from life the miseries of an author's existence. Fielding, Smollett, and Goldsmith have described tlie poor wretches with a vivid force which gives sadness to the rellection that each of tliose great men was drawing upon his own experience, and that they each died in distress. The Case of Authors by Profession to quote the title of a panipldet by Ralph, was indeed a wretched one, when the greatest of their number had an incessant struggle to keep the wolf from the door. The life of an author resembled the proverbial existence of the flying-fish, chased by enemies in sea and in air ; he only escaped from the slavery of the bookseller's garret, to fly from the bailiff" or rot in the debtor's ward or the spunging- house. Many strange half-pathetic and half-ludicrous anec- dotes survive to recall the sorrows and the recklessness of the luckless scribblers who, like one of Johnson's acquain- tance, '* lived in London and hung loose upon society." There was Samuel P.oyse, for example, whose poem on the Deity is quoted with high praise by Fielding. Once Johnson had generously exerted himself for his comrade in misery, and collected enough money by sixpences to get the poet's clothes out of pawn. Two days afterwards, Boyse had spent the money and was found in bed, covered only with a blanket, through two holes in which he passed his arms to write. Boyse, it appears, when still in this posi- tion would lay out his last half-guinea to buy truffles and mushrooms for his last scrap of beef. Of another scribbloi Johnson said, " I honour Derrick for his strength of mind. 14 I 20 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [chap. ' ) ■i hf ■ '' 1" wt 1 ■■ ■^.i One night when Floyd (anothor poor authoi) was wandor- ing about tlie streets at night, he found Derrick fast asleep upon a bulk. Upon being suddenly awaked, Derrick started up ; ' IMy dear Floyd, I am sorry to sec you in this destitute state ; will you go lioine with me to my lodgings?' " Authors in such circumstances might be forced into such a wonderful contract as that which is reported to have been draAvn up by one Gardner with Eolt and Christopher Smart. They were to write a monthly miscellany, sold at sixpence, and to have a third of the profits ; but they Avere to write nothing else, and the contrnct was to last for ninety-nine years. Johnson himself summed up the trade upon earth by the lines in which Virgil describes the entrance to hell ; thus translated by Dryden : — Just in the pate and in tho jaws of lioU, Eevengofiil cares and sullen sorrows dwell. And pale diseases and repining age, Want, fear, and famine's i.nrcsistod rago : Here toils and Death and Death's half-brother, Sleep— Forms, terrible to view, their sentry keep. " Now," said Johnson, " almost all those apply exactly to an author; these are the concomitants of a printing- bouse." Judicious authors, indeed, were learning how to make literature pay. Some of them belonged to the class who understood the great truth that the scissors are a very superior implement to the pen considered as a tool of literary trade. Such, for example, was that respectable Dr. John Campbell, whose parties Johnson ceased to fre- (jucnt lest Scotchmen should say of any good bits of work, " Ay, ay, he has learnt this of Cawmell." Campbell, he said quaintly, was a good man, a pious man. " I am aliaid ha [chap. II.] LITERARY CAREER. 21 has not been in tlio inside of a clmrch for many years j but he never passes a church without pulling off his hat. This shows ho has good principles," — of Avhich in flxct tlieie eeems to be some less questionable evidence. Campbell sup- ported himself by writings chiefly of the Encyclopedia or Gazetteer kind ; and became, still in Johnson's phrase, "the richest author that ever grazed the common of literature." A more singular and less reputable cliaracter was that impudent quack, Sir John Hill, who, with his insolent attacks upon the Eoyal Society, pretentious botanical and medical compilations, plays, novels, and magazine articles, has long sunk into utter oblivion. It is said of him that he pursued every branch of literary quackery with greater contempt of character than any man of his time, and that he made as much as £1500 in a year;— three times as much, it is added, as any one writer ever made in the same period. The political scribblers — the Arnalls, Gordons, Trench- ards, Guthries, lialplis, and Amhersts, whose names meet us in the notes to tlie Dunciad and in contemporary pamphlets and newspapers — form another variety of the class. Their general character may be estimated from Johnson's classification of the " Scribbler for a Party " with the " Commissioner of Excise," as the " two lowest of all human beings." " Ealph," says one of the notes to the Diniciad, " ended in tlie common sink of all such writers, a political newspaper." The prejudice against such em- ployment has scarcely died out in our own day, and may be still traced in the account of Pendennis ciud his friend Warrington. People who do dirty work nnist be paid foi it ; and the Secret Committee which inquired into Wal- pole'sadministnition reported that in ten years, from 1731 to 1741, a sum of .£.50.077 18.«*. had been paid to writei-n i Mb i " n i 22 SAMUEL J JHNSON. [CH*F. i and printers of newspapers. Arnall, now remembered cliiefiy by Pope's liue, — Spirit of Arnall, aii mo whilst I Ho I had received, in four years, £10,997 6s. 8d. of tins amount. The more successful writers might look to pensions or pre- ferment. Francis, for example, the translator of Horace, and the Either, in all probability, of the most formidable of tlie whole tribe of such literary gladiators, received, it is said, 900Z. a year for his work, besides being appointed to a rectory and the chaplaincy of Chelsea. Tt must, moreover, be observed that the price of literary work was rising during the century, and that, in the latter half, considerable sums were received by successful writers, lieligious as well as dramatic literature had begun to be commercially valuable. Baxter, in the previous century, made from 601. to 801. a year by his pen. The copyright of Tillotson's Sermons was sold, it is said, upon his death for £2500. Considerable sums were made by the plan of publishing by subscription. It is said that 4600 people subscribed to the two posthumous volumes of Conybeare's Sermons. A few poets trod in Pope's steps. Young made mc:;o than £3000 for the Satires called the Universal Pas- sion, published, I think, on the same plan ; and the Duke of Wharton is said, though the report is doubtful, to have given him £2000 for the same work. Gay made £1000 by his Poems ; £400 ibr the copyright of the Beggar's Opera, and three times as much for its second part, Polbj. Among historians, Hume seems to have received £700 a volume ; Smollett made £2000 by his catchpenny rival publication; Henry made £3300 by his history; and Robertson, after the booksellbrs had made £G000 by hia History of Scoilaud, sold his Charles V. for £4500. a] LITERARY CAREER. 23 Amongst the norelists, Fcilding received £700 for Tom Jones and £1000 for Amelia ; Sterne, for the second edi- tion of the first part of Tridram Shandy and for two additional volumes, reccnved £650 ; besides which Lord Fauconberg gave him a living (most inappropriate acknow- ledgment, one would say!), and Warburton a purse of gold. Goldsmith received 60 guineas for the immortal Vicar, a fair price, according to Johnson, for a work by a then unknown author. By each of his plays he made about £500, and for the eight volumes of his Natural Ilistorij he receiv'ed 800 guineas. Towards the end of the century, Mrs. Radcliife got £500 for the Mijsferies of Udolpho, and £800 for her last work, the Italian. Perhaps the largest sum given for a single book was £6000 paid to Hawkesworth for his account of the South Sea Expedi- tior . Home Tooko received from £4000 to £5000 for the Diversions of Parley ; and it is added by his biographer, though it seems to be incredible, that Hayley received no less than £11,000 for the Life of Cowper. This was, of course, in the present century, when we are already approaching the period of Scott and Byron. Such sums prove that some few authors might achieve independence by a successful work ; and it is well to remember them in considering Johnson's life from the business point of view. Though he never grumbled at the booksellers, and on the contrary, was always ready to de- fend them as liberal men, he certainly failed, whether from carelessness or want of skill, to turn them to as much profit as many less celebrated rivals. Meanwhile, pecu- niary success of this kind was beyond any reasonable hopes. A man who has to work like his o .vn dependent Levett, and to make the " modest toil of every day" supply *♦ the wants r>f every day," muft discount his tfllenta until ht ' 'ivl 'II mi f Ill 24 SAMDEL JOHNSON. [cHAr. can eecuro leisure for some mow sustained cH'urt. Johnson, coming up from tlio country to seek for work, could have but a slender prospect of rising above tlio ordinary level of his Grub Street conipanions and rivals. One publisher to whom Ik; applied suggested to him that it would be liia wisest course to buy a porter's knot and carry trunks ; and, in the struggle Avhich followed, Johnson must some- times have been tempted to regret that the advice was not taken. The detiiils of the ordeal through which he \/as nov/ to jiass have naturally vanished. Johnson, long after- wards, burst into tears on recalling the trials of this period. But, at the time, no one was interested in noting the history of an obscure literary drudge, and it has not been described by the sullerer himself. What we know is derived from a few letters and incidental references of Johnson in later days. On Ih'st arriving in London he was ahuost destitute, and had to join with Garrick in raising a loan of five pounds, which, wo are glad to say, was repaid. He dined f )r eiglitpence at an ordinary : a cut of meat for sixpence, bread for a penny, and a penny to the waiter, making out the charge. One of his acquaintance had told him that a man might live in London for thirty pounds a year. Ten pounds would pay for clothes ; a garret might be hired for eighteen-pence a week ; if any one asked for an address, it was easy to reply, " I am to be found at such a place." Threepence laid out at a coilee-house would enable him to pass some hours a day in good company ; dinner might be had for sixpence, a biead-and-milk breakfiist for a penny, and supper Avas superfluous. On clean shirt day you might go abroad and pay visits. This leaves a surjjlus of nearly one pound trom the tiiirty. n.] LITERAEY CABEER. 28' Johnson, however, hai a wife to support ; and to raise funds for even so fx;.cetic a mode of existence reriuirud steady labour. Often, it seems, liis purse was at the very lowest ebb. One of liis letters to his employer is signed inprarmis ; and whether or not the dinnerless condition wa(; in this case accidental, or signilicant of absolute impccuniosity, the less pleasant interpretation is not im- I)robable. He would walk the streets all night with his iriehd, Savage, when their combined funds could not i)ay for a lodging. One night, as 'le told Sir Joshua EeynoMs in later years, they thus ])eram]iulated St. James's Square;, warming themselves by declaiming against Walpole, and nobly resolved that they would stand by their country. Patriotic enthusiasm, however, as no one knew Ix'ttei than Jolinson, is a poor substitute for bed and supper. Johnson sutl'cred acutely and made some attempts to escape from his ini.sery. To tlu* end of his life, he was grateful to those wlio had lent him a helping hand. " Harry Hervey," he said of one of them shortly before his death, " was a vicious man, but very kind to me. If you call a dog Hervey, I shall love him." I'ope was im- pressed by the excellence of his lirst poem, London, and induced Lord Gower to write to a friend to beg Swift to obtain a degree for Johnson from the University of Dublin. The terms of this circuitous application, curious, as bringing into connexion three of the most eminent men of letters of the day, prove that the youngest of them was at the time (1739) in deep distress. The object of the degree was to qualify Johnson for a mastership of £60 a year, which would make him happy for life. He would rather, said Lord Gower, die upon the road to Dublin if an examination were necessary, "than be starved te death in translating for b oksellers, which has been his 2* i JBfi^A 26 SAMUKIi JOHNSON. [CH4P. I , I only subsistence ft r some time past." The application failed, howcvor, uikI tho want of a dcf^reo was etpially I'iital to another application to be admitted to practise at Doctor's Commons. Literatim; was thus perforce Johnson's sole support; and by literature was meant, for the most part, drudgery of the kind indicated by the phrase, " translating for book- sellers." While still in Lichfield, Johnson had, as I have snid, written to Cave, proposing to become a contributor to the Crci/tlcmaii'f^ Mci'j'tzhie. The letter was one of those which a modern editor receives by the dozen, and answers as perfunctorily as his consci"nce will allow. It seems, how- ever, to have made some impres.'-ion upon Cave, and possibly led to Johnson's employment by him on his first arrival in London. From 1738 he as employed both on the Magazine and in some jobs of translation. Edward Cave, to whom we Jijfe thus intnxluced, was a man of some mark in the history of literature. Johnson always spoke of him with affection and aft(>rwards wrote his life in complimentary terms. Cave, though a clui"sy, phleg- matic person of little cultivation, seems to have been one of those men who, whilst destitute of real critical powers, have a certain instinct for recognizing the commercial value of literary wares. He had become by this time well-known as tlie publisher of a magazine which survives to this day. Journals containing summaries of passing events had already been started. Boyer's Political State of Great Britain began in 17H. The Historical Retjis- ter, which added to a chronicle some literary notices, was started in 1716. The Grub Street Journal was anothcir journal with fuller critical notices, which first appeared in 1730 ; and these two seem to have been superseded by the Ocntleman's Alayam.i, started by Cave in the next year. ,( I *> [chap. II.J LITERAEY CAREER. 27 Johnson saw in it an opening for the eniploymtrnt of hia literary talents ; and rc^'anlcd its contril)ution8 with tliat awe so natural in youtlii'id aspirants, and at once so comic and patlietic to Avriters of a little exi)erience. The names of many of Cave's staff are preserved in a note to Hawkins. One or two of them, such as Birch and Akensido, have still a certain interest lor students of literature ; but few have heard of the great IMoses Browne,'who was regarded as the great poetical light of the magazine. Johnson looked up to him as a leader in his craft, and was graciously taken by Cave to an alehouse in Clerkenwell, where, wrapped in a horseman's coat, and " a great bushy uncombed wig," he saw Mr, Browne sitting at the end of a long table, in a cloud of tobacco-smoke, and felt the satisfaction of a true hero-worshipper. It is needless to describe in detail the literary task-work done by Johnson at this period, the Latin poems which he contributed in praise of Cave, and of Cave's friends, or the Jacobite squibs by which he relieved his anti-minis- terialist feelings. One incident of the period doubtless refreshed the soul of many authors, who have shared Campbell's gratit'-le to iS'apoleon for the sole redeeming action of his life -the sliooting of a bookseller. Johnson was employed by Osljrno, a rough specimen of the trade, to make a catalogue of the Harleian Library. Osborne oilensively reproved him for negligence, and Johnson knocked him down with a folio. The book with which the feat was performed (Blblia Grceca Septuaginta, fol. 1594, Frankfort) was in existence in a bookseller's shop at Cambridge in 1812, and should surely have been placed in some safe author's museum. The most remarkable of Johnson's perf lances as a hack writer deserves a brief notice. He was one oi tlie C » '' 1 > t \: .\ I III .3 liii I \i.' 28 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [CHAl-. fiiflt of reporters. Cuve publishod sucli roports of the debates in I'arliiiniont an were then allowoil by the jealous}- of tho Legislature, under tlio title of 77ie Seiiafe of Lillipiit. JoliUHoii was the author of the debates from Nov. 1740 to Febniiiry l'^42. Persons were employed lo attend in tho two Houses, who brouj^lit home notes of the «peeehes, which were then put into shape by Johnson. Long ai't(!r\varda, at a dumcr at Foote's, Francis (the father of Junius) mentioned a apeecli of l^itt's as the liest ho iiad ever read, and superior to anything in Demostlienes. Her(!Upon Johnson re[)liiMl, "I wrote that speech in a garret in Exeter Street." Wlien iIk; company aj)i)]auded not only his ekxiuence but his impartiality, Joimson replied, "That is not quite true; I saved appearances tolerably well, but I took care tliat tlui Whig dogs should not have the best of it." The speeches passed for a time as accurate ; though, in truth, it has been proved and it is easy to observe, that they are, in fuct, very viig-ia reflections of the original. The editors of Chesterticld's Works published two of the speeches, and, to Johnson s considerable amusement, declared that one of them re- sembled Demosthenes and the other Cicero. Ic is plain enough to the modern reader that, if so, both of the ancient orators must have written true Johnsonese ; and, in fact, the style of the true author is often as plainly marked in many of these compositions as in t.io Jldmhler or Ras,^ehts. For this deception, such as it was, Johnson expressed penitence at the end of his life, though he said that he had ceased to write when ho found that they were taken as genuine. He would not be " accessory to the propagation of falsehood." Another of Johnson's works which appealed in 1744 requires notice both for its intrindc merit, and its auti>- i LITERARY CARKEU. biographical inturost. Tlio most rL'iiiiirk;ibl«< of h\» CJruH Strt'ot companions was tho Kicbanl Savaj^i) already in«'n. tionod. Johnson's life of hiiu writton soon aftuiliis deal is onoof his most foi'(:il)lo pm-formanccs, au'l thnbcst extant illustration of tlio iifo of tbu 8tru<,';^'lin<,' authors of the time. Sav.ago claimed to bo tho illcyitimato son of tho Countess of ^Macclesfield, who was divorced from her hus- band in tho year of his birth on account of her connexion with his supposed father, Lord Rivers. According to tlio story, believed by Johnson, and published without her contradiction in the mother's lil'ftinie, she not only die- avowed her son, but cherished an unnatural hatred foi him. She tohl his father that he was dead, in order that ho might not bo bonelited by the father's will ; she tried to have nim kidnapped and sent to tho plantations; and she did her best to prevent him from receiving a jjardon when ho had been sentenced to death for killing a man in a tavern brawl. However this may be, and there are rcuisons for doubt, tho story was generally believed, and caused much sympathy for tho supposed victim. Savage was at one time protected by tho kindness of Steele, who published his story, and sometimes employed him as a literary assistant. AVhen Steele became disgusted with him, ho received generous help from the actor Wilks and from Mrs. Oldlield, to whom he had been introduced by some drama- tic ellorts. Then ho was taken up by Lonl Tyrconnel, but abandoned by him after a violent quarrel ; he afterwards called himself a volunteer laureate, and received a pension of 501. a year from Queen Caroline ; on her death he was fi.vnvvn into deep distress, and helped by a subscription to which Pope was the chief contributor, on condition of retiring to the country. Ultimately he quarrelled with hia last protectors, and ended by dying in a dobtor'a prieon. ' l' \: H ,.||!'1 ,* H H,M 80 SAMUEL JOUNSON. [OMAf P 1 ! ! 1 111 YarioiH itoctioal works, now uttcn-ly forgotten, obtainod for liim scjuity prnlit. Thi.s curocr stilHciimtly rt'voiils the cliiimcter. 8;vvii;^'o holongcd to tin; vi-ry coiiunon typci ol men, who si'ciii to cinploy thoir wholo taleuts to throw away thfir cliaiiciirt in lilt', ami to disgust ovcry oiio who oifcrH thorn a li(!l[)iii<,' hand. IIu was, however, u man of somo talent, though his poems are now hojiele.ssly unreadablo, and seems to have had a singular attraction lor Johnson. Tlie biograpliy i» curiously niurkisd by Johnson's constant effort to put the best face upon faults, which he has too much love of truth to conceal. The explaiiati(ui is, partly, that Johnson conceived liiniself to be avenging a victim of cruel oppression. "This mother," he says, after recording her vindictiveness, " is still alive, and may perhaps even yet, though her malice was often defeated, onjoy the pl(!asure of rellectiug that the life, v/hich she often endea- voured to destroy, was at last shortened by her maternal ollices ; that thougli she could not transport her son to the plantations, bury him in the shop of a mechanic, or hastcui the hand of the public executioner, sli<^ has yet had the satisfaction of embittering all his hours, and forcing him into exigencies that hurried on his death." ]hit it is also probable that Savage had a strong inlluence upon Johnson's mind at a very inipressil)lo part of his career. The young v still ignorant of life and full of reverent enthusiasm foi the literary magnates of his time, was impressed by the varied experience of his companion, and, it may bo, flattered by his intimacy. Savage, he says admiringly, had enjoyed great opportunities of seeing the most conspicuous men of the day in their private life. He was shrewd and inquisitive enough to use his opportunities well. " More circumstances to constitute a critic on human life could noteabily concur." Thoonly phrase which survives n.] LITERARY CAREER. ni to jtiHtifythiH roni.irk is Siivugo's st'itciuont about Wiilpole, tlmt " tho wholy mngc oljiis iniml was from obHcynity to politics, and from politics to olweeiiity." W« may, how- ever, giu'ss what, Nvas tlu! special charm of tho intercourse to Joluisoii. Savage was an expva in that, science of huniiin nature, learnt from experience not from books, upon which Johnson sot so high a value, and of which ho was di'atin(?d to become the authorized expositor. Thoro were, more- over, rescml)];! ices between the two men. They were both admired and sought out for their conversational powers. Savage, indeed, seems to have lived chielly by tho people who entertained him for talk, till he had di.sgu.sted them by his insolence and his utt(!r ilisreganl of time and pro- priety. Ho would, like Johnson, sit up talking beyond mid- night, and next day decline to rise till dinner-time, though his fa\ xirite drink was not, like JohnsonV, free from intoxi- cating properties. JJoth of them had a lofty pride, which Johnson heartily commends in Savage, though he has diffi- culty in palliating some of its manifestations. One of the stories reminds us of an anecdote already related of Jolin- son himself. Some clothes had been left for Savage at a colleehouso by a person who, out of delicacy, concealed his name. Savage, however, resented .some want of ceremony, and refused to enter the house again till tho clothes had been removed. What was honourable pride in Johnson was, indeed, simple arrogance in Savage. Ho asked favours, his bio- grapher says, without submission, and resented refusal as an insult. He had too much pride to acknowledge, not not too much to receive, obligations ; enough to quarrel with his charitable benefactors, but not enough to make him rise to indej)endence of theii- charity. His pension would have sufficed to keep him, only that as soon as he received it b< I: ,.t 82 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [CHAP. \ Id retired from tho sight of all his .acquaintanco, and came back before long as penniless ^as before. This conduct, observes his biographer, was ** very particuLir." It was hartUy so singular as objectionable ; and we are not sur- prised to be told that he was rather a " friend of goodness " than himself a good man. In short, we may say of him as Bbauclerk said of a friend of Boswell's that, if he had ex- cellent principles, ho did not wear them out in practice. There is something quaint about this picture of a tho- rough-paced scamp, admiringly painted by a virtuous man ; forced, in spite of himself, to make it a likeness, and striving in vain to make it attractive. But it is also pathetic when Wb remember that Johnson shared some patt at least of his hero's miseries. " On a bulk, in a cellar, or in a glass-house, among thieves and beggars, was to be found the author of The Wanderer, the man of exalted sentiments, extensive views, and curious observations ; the man whose remarks on life might have assisted the statesman, whoso ideas of virtue might have enlightened the moralist, Avhose elo- cpiencc might have influenced senators, and whose delicacy might have polished courts." Very shocking, no doubt, and yet hardly surprising under the circumstances ! To us it is more interesting to remember that the author of the Rambler was not only a synq)athizor, but a fellow- sulferer with the author of the Wanderer, and shared the queer " lodgings " of his friend, as Floyd shared the lodgings of Derrick. Johnson haj)pily came unscathed through the ordeal which was too much for poor Savage, and could boast with perfect truth in later life that " no man, who ever lived by literature, had lived more independently than I have done." It was in so strange a school, and under such questionable teaching that Joimson formed his character of the world and of the cou [CBAF. n.] LITERARY CAREER. 83 duct befittin.cf its inmates. Oiio characteristic conclusion is indicated in the opening passage of the life. It has always been observed, ho says, that men eminent by nature or fortune are not generally liappy : " whether it bo tliat apparent superiority incit(>s great designs, and great designs are naturally liable to fatal miscarriages ; or that the general lot of mankind is misery, and the misfortunes of those, whose eminence drew upon them an universal attention, have been more carefully recorded because they were more generally observed, and have in reality been only more conspicuous than those of others, not more frequent or more severe." The last explanation was that which really commended itself to Johnson. N"obody had better reason to know tliat obscurity might conceal a misery as bitter as any tliat fell to the lot of the most eminent. The gloom due to his constitutional temperament was intensified by the sense that he and his wife were dependent upon the goodwill of a nar- row and ignorant tradesman for the scantiest maintenance. How was he to reach some solid standing-ground above the hopeless mire of Grub Street? As a journeyman author he could make both ends meet, but only on condition oi incessant labour. Illness and misfortune Avould mean constant dependence upon charity or bondage to creditors. To get ahead of the world it was necessary to distinguish himself in some way from the herd of needy competitors. He had come up from Lichfield with a play in his pocket, but the i)lay did not seem at present to have much chance of emerging. Meanwhile he published a poem which did something to give him a general reputation. London — an imitation of the Third Satire of Juvenal was published in May, 1738. The plan was doubtlesti suggested by Pope's imitations of Horace, which had t-- in 84 SAMUKL JOHNSON. [cBir. T recently appeared. Though necessarily follo\ring the linea of Juvonal's poem, and conforming to the conventional fashion of the time, both in sentiment and versification, the poem has a biographical signiiicance. It is indeed odd to iind Johnson, who afterwards thouglit of London as a lover of his mistress, and who despised notliing more heartily than the cant of llousseau ami the sentinientalists, Adopting in this poem the ordinary denunciations of the corruption of towns, and singing the praises of an innocent country life. Doubtless, the young writer was like other young men, taking up a strain still imitative and artificial. He has a quiet smile at Savage in the life, because in his retreat to Wales, that enthusiast declared that he " could not debar himself from the happiness which was to be found in the calm of a cottage, or lose the opportunity of listening without intermission to the melody of the nightingale, which he believed was to be heard from evei-y bramble, and which he did not fail to mention as a very important part of the happiness of a country life." In London, this insincere cockney adopts Savage's view. Thales, who is generally supposed to represent Savage (and this coincidence seems to conlirm the opinion), is to retire " from the dungeons of the Strand," and to end a healthy life in pruning walks and twining bowers in his garden. There every bush with nature's music rings, There every brseze bears health upon its wings. Johnson had not yet learnt the value of perfect sincerity even in poetry. But it must also be admitted that Lo' don, aa seen by the poor drudge from a Grub Street garret, pro- bably presented a prospect gloomy enough to make even Johnson long at tinier for rural solitude. The poem rellects, too, the ordinary talk of the heterogeneous band of patriots. «.] LITERARY CAREER. 35 i Jacobites, and disappointed Wlugs, who wore beginning to gather enough strength to throatoii Walp)le'3 long tenure of power. ^Vfany refer nces to contemporar}' politics iUiistrate Johnson's sympathy with the inhabitants of the contemporary Cave of AduUam. This poem, as ah-eady stated, attracted Pope's notice, who made a curious note on a scrap of paper sent with it to a friend. Johnson is described as " a man afflioteil with an infirmity of the convulsive kind, that attacks him some- times so as to make him a sad spectacle." This seems to have been the chief information obtained by Pope about the anonymous author, of whom be had said, on first read- ing the poem, this man will soon bo deterrc. London made a certain noise ; it reached a second edition in a week, and attracted various patrons, among others, General Ogle- thorpe, celebrated by Pope, and through a long life the warm friend of Johnson. One line, however, in the poera printed in capital letters, gives the moral which was doubt- less most deeply felt by the author, and whicli di 15 M t i- IH m 36 SAMUEL JOUNSON. [chap. 1 'i M ,1 'i / ' i; Ml I i.n li ! ,1 'I' timont, Vanitas Vanitatum, make it perhaps the most impressive poem of the kind in the language. The lines on the scholar's fate show that the iron had entered his soul in tlie interval. Should the scholar succeed beyond expectation in his labours and escape melancholy and disease, yet, he says, — Yet Iiopo not life from griof antl dancrer free, Nor think the doom of man reversed on thee ; Deign on tho passing world to turn thine eyes And pause awhilo from letters, to bo wiso ; There mark what ills tho scholar's lifo assail, Toil, envy, want, the patron and tho jail ; See nations, slowly wise and meanly just. To buried merit raise tho tardy bust. If dreams yet flatter, once again attend. Hear Lydiat'8 life and Galileo's end. For the '* patron," Johnson had originally written the "garret." The change was made alter an experience of patronage to be presently described in connexion with the Dictionary. For London Johnson received ten guineas, and for the Vanity of Human Wishes fifteen. Though indirectly valuable, as increasing his reputation, such work was not very profitable. The most promising career in a pecuniary sense was still to be found on the stage. Novelists v/ero not yet the rivals of dramatists, and many authors had made enough by a successful play to float them tlirough a year or two. Johnson had probably been determined by his knowledge of this fact to write the tragedy of Irene. No other excuse at least can be given for tho composition of one of tho heaviest and most unreadable of dramatic performances, interesting now, if interesting at all, solely as a curious example of the result of bestowing great powers upon a totally uncongenial task Young men, "•] LITEllARY CABEEE. 'in 87 however, may be pardoned for such blunders if they are not repeated, and Jolinson, thougli lie seems to have retained a fondness ior liis unhicky performance, never indulged in playwriting after leaving Lichfield. The host thing .connected with the play was Johnson's retort to his friend Walmsley, the Lichfiehl registrar. "How," asked Walmsley, " can you contrive to plunge your heroine into deeper calamity ? " " Sir," said Johnson, " I can put her into the spiritual court." Even Eoswcll can only say fur Ire7ie that it is " entitled to the praise of superior ex- cellence," and admits its entire absence of dramatic power. Garrick, who had become manager of Drury Lane, pro- duced his friend's work in 1749. The play was carried through nine nights by Garrick's friendly zeal, so that the author had his three nights' profits. For this he received £195 17s. and for the copy he had £100. People pro- bably attended, as they attend modern representations of legitimate drama, rather from a sense of duty, than in the hope of pleasure. The heroine originally had to speak two lines Avith a bowstring round her neck. The situation produced cries of murder, and she had to go olf the stage alive. The objectionable passage was removed, but Irene was on the Avholo a failure, and has never, I ima'nne. made another uppoarance. When asked how he felt upon his ill-success, he replied " like the monument," and indeed he made it a principle throughout life to accept the de- cision of the public like a sensible man without murmurs. Meanwhile, Johnson was already embarked upon an undertaking of a very different kind. In 17-17 he had put forth a plan for an English Dictionary, addressed at the suggestion of Dodsley, to Lord Chesterfield, then Secretary of State, and the great contemporary Mtecenas. Johnson had apparently been maturing the scheme for m < i i 38 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [CHJLi ■ ;i i I 1 i' some time. " I know," ho says in the " plan," that " the work in wliich I engaged is generally considered ae drudgery lor tlio blind, as the proper toil of artlesf: industry, a book tliat requires neither the light of learning nor the activity of genius, but may be successfully per- formed without any higher quality than tlmt of bearing burdens Avith dull patience, and beating the track of the alphabet with sluggish resolution." He adds in a sub- sarcastic tone, that although princes and statesmen had once thought it lionourable to patronize dictionaries, ho had considered such benevolent acts to be " prodigies, recorded rath(!r to raise wonder than expectation," and lie was ac- cordingly pleased and surprised to find that Chesterfield took an interest in his undertaking. Ho proceeds to lay down the general principles upon which he intends to frame his Avork, in order to invito timely suggestions and repress unreasonable expectations. At this time, humble as his aspirations might be, he took a view of the possi- bihties open to him which had to be lowered before the publication of the dictionary. He sliared the illusion tliat a language miglit be "fixed" by making a catalogue of its words. In the preface which a})peared with the completed Avork, he explains very sensibly the vanity of any such expectation. Whilst all human afi\^irs are changing, it is, as he says, absurd to imagine that the language Avhich repeats all human thoughts and feelings can remain unaltered. A die tionary, as Jolinson conceived it, Avas in fact Avork for a " harmless drudge," the definition of a lexicographer given in the book itself. Etymology in a scientific sense Avas as yet non-existent, and Johnson Avas not in this re- spect alioad of his contemporaries. To collect all the Avorda in the language, to define iheir meanings as accurately as u.j LITERARY CARKER. 39 mi^ht be, to give the obvious or whimsical guesses at Etymology suggested by previous writers, and to append a good collection of illustrative passagt-s was the sum of his iimhition. Any systematic training of the historical pro- cesses by which a particular language had been developed was unknown, and of course the result could not be anticipated. The work, indeed, required a keen logical faculty of delinition, and wide reading of the English literature of the two preceding centuries ; but it could of course give no play either for the higher literary faculties on points of scientific investigation. A dictionary in Johnson's sense was the highest kind of v/ork to which a literary journeyman could be set, but it was still work for a journeyman, not for an artist. He Avas not adding to literature, but providing a useful implement for future men of letters. Johnson had thus got on hand the biggest job that could be well undertaken by a good workman in his humble craft. He was to receive fifteen hundred and seventy-five pounds for the whole, and ho expected to finish it in three years. The money, it is to be observed, was to satisfy not only Johnson but several copyists employed in the mechanical part of the work. It Avaa advanced by instalments, and came to an end before the conclusion of the book. Indeed, it appeared when accounts were settled, that he had received a hundred pounds more than was due. Ho could, however, pay his way for the time, and would gain a reputation enough to (;nsure work in future. The period of extreme poverty had probably ended when Johnson got permanent employ- ment on the GenUeman's Magazine. He was not elevated above the need of drudgery and economy, but ho might at least be free from the dread of neglect Ho could J 'lU-f i!f! 40 <>4lMUKL jounson. [CHAJ, ., ) commaud his market— such as it was. Tin; necessity o( Eteady labour was i)robaljly unfelt in ruijclliiig In's (its of uielanclioly. His iiaiiie was Ijoginniiig to bo known, and men of reputation were seeking liis acquaintance. In tlio winter of 174!) lie formed a club, whicli met weekly at a "famous beef-steak house" in Ivy Lane. Among its members were Hawkins, afterwards his biographer, and two friends, IJatliurst a physician, and Ilawkcsworth an author, for the iirst of wliom he entertained an unusually strong aflection. The Club, lik(! its more famous successor, gave Johnson an opportunity of displaying and improving his great conversational powers. He Avas already dreaded for his prowess in argument, his dictatorial manners and vivid Hashes of Avit and humour, the more effective from the habitual gloom and ai:)i)arent heaviness of the dis- courser. The talk of this society probably suggested topics for the Edmhhr, which ajjpeared at this time, and caused Johnson's fame to spread further beyond the literary circles of London. The wit and humour have, indeed, left few traces upon its pondcrcas images, for the Ramhhr marks the culminating period of Joh.ison's worst qualities of style. The pompous and involved language seems indeed to be a fit clothing for the melancholy reflections which ar(^ its chief staple, and in spite of its unmistakable power it is as heavy reading as the heavy class of lay-sermonizing to which it belongs. Such literature, however, is often strangely popular in England, and the liamhlcr, though its circulation was limited, gave to Johnson his positior as a great practical moralist. Ho took his literary title one may say, from the RamUer, as the more familiar titl^ <*.-as derived from the Dldionai-y. The Ramhler was published twice a week from March n.J LITEKARY CAllEEE. •11 20th, 1750, to l^Iarch 14th, 1752. In five numbers alone ho received assistance from i'riends, and one of these, written by Ric;liards(jn, is said to liavo been the onlj ninnbor whiuli had a large sale. Tlie circulation rarely exoii* led 500, tliough ten Englisli editions were published in 'ho author's lifetime, besides Scotch and Irisli editions. The payment, however, namely, two guineas a number, must have been welcome tt uohnson, and the friendship of many distinguished men of the time was a still mory valuable reward. A quaint story illustrates the hero- worship of whi;;h Johnson now became the oly'ect. Dr. jjurney, afterwards an intimate friend, had introduced himself to Johnson by letter in consequence of the Raml)ler, and the plan of the Didloiianj. Tlie admiration was shared by a A-iend of Burney's, a Mr. Bewley, known— in Norfolk at least — as the " philosopher of Masslngham." When Burney at last gained the honour of a personal interview, he wished to procure some " relic " of Jolinson for his fiiend. lie cut off some bristles from a hearth- broom in the doctor's chambers, and sent them in a letter to his fellow-enthusiast. Long afterwards Johnson was pleased to hear of this simple-minded homage, and not only sent a copy of the Lives of the Poets to the rural phi- losopher, but deigned to grant him a personal interview. Dearer than any such praise w^as the approval of John- son's wife. She told him that, well n'? she had thought of him before, she had not considered iiii.i i qual to such a performance. The voice that so charmed him was soon to be silenced for ever. jNFrs. Johnson died (March 17th, 1752) three days after the ap2)earance of the last Rambbr. The man who has passed through such a triid knows well that, whatever may be in store for him in the dark future, fate can have no heavier blow in reserve. Thouuh Johi)' 3 » nl •fw^nai^iirt wiiiitaWM 1 1 m 42 SAMUEL J0UN80N. [CMAi>, I f son OI1C8 aoknowl('(l<,'{;d to Boswull, when in a placid humour, that hiij)))iin' days liful coiuo to liim in his old ago than ill his early life, ho would prnluibly have addod tlial thou^di lUnio and friendship and iVct'doin froTii the har- rowing cares of jjoverty might cause his life to ho more e(|uably happy, yet their rewards could re|)rosent but a faint and njocking reflection of the best moments of a happy uianiag(!. His strong mind and tender nature reeled under the blow. Hero is one ])athetic little note written to tlio friend, Dr. Taylor, who had come to him in hia distress. That which first announced the calani ty, and which, said Taylor, " expressed grief in tho oirongebt manner he had ever read," is lost. "Dear Sir, — Let nie have your company and instruc- 'ion. Do not live away from mo. ^ly distress is great. " Pray desire Mrs. Taylor to inform me what mourning I shoidd buy for my mother and JMiss Porter, and bring a note in writing witli you. " Iveniember me in your prayers, for vain is tho help of man. " I am, dear sir, " Sam. JonNSON." We need not regret that a veil is drawn over the detaUe of tho bitter agony of his passage through tho valley of the shadow of death. It is enough to put down the wails which he wrote long aft( ! v'ards when visibly ap- proaching the close of all human emotions and interests : — "This is tho day on which, in 1752, dear Letty died. I have now uttered a prayer of repentance and contrition j perhaps Letty knows that I prayed ibr her. Perhaps Letty is now praying for me. God help me. Thou, God, art merciful, liear my prayers and enable mo to tnist in Thee. \^ U tl.J LITERARY CAREER. 4'd "We wero mtinietl uluiost Hovonteon years, and have Df w beoji parted thirty." It seenia half i)roraii(!, even at this distance of time, to pry into grief so ,n be said ; yet perhaps it should be added that Johnson remarked that he had once received £\0 froui Cliestoi'iield, though he thought the assistance too ineonsidenible to be mentioned in such a letter. Haw- kins also states that Chesterlielil sent overtures to Johnson through two friends, one of Avhom, long Sir Thomas lio- binson, statea that, if he were rich enough (a judicious clause) he wouM himself settle £500 a year upon Johnson. Johnson re})lied that if the first peer of the realm made such an olfcsr, he would sliow him the Avay downstairs. Hawkins is startled at this insolence, and at Johnson's uniform assertion that an offer of money was an insult. We ciinnot tell what was the history of the £10 ; but Johnson, in spite of Hawkins's righteous indignation, was in fact tcT If. 1 \ a.] LITERARY CAREER. 47 proud to bo a beggar, and owed to his pride his escape from the fate of Savage. The appearance of the Dictionarij placed Joliason in the position described soon afterwards by Smollett. Pic was henceforth " the great Cham of Literature" — a monarch sitting in the cliair previously occupied by his namesake, Ben, by Dry den, and by Pope ; but which has since that time been vacant. The world of literature has become too large for such authority. Complaints were not seldom uttered at the time. Goldsmith has urged that Boswell wished to make a monarchy of what ought to be a republic. Goldsmith, who would have been the last man to find serious fault with the dictator, thought the dictatorship objectionable. Some time indeed was still to elapse before we can say that Johnson was firmly seated on the throne \ but the Dictionary and the Rambler had given him a position not altogether easy to appreciate, now that the Dictionarij has been superseded and the Rambler gone out of fashion. His name was the highest at this time (1755) in the ranks of pure literature. The fame of Warburton possibly bulked larger for the moment, and one of his flatterers was comparing him to the Colossus which be- strides the petty world of contemporaries. But Warburton had subsided into episcopal repose, and literature had been for him a stepping-stone rather than an ultimate aim. Hume had Avritten works of far more enduring infiuenco than Johnson ; but they were little read though generally abused, and scarcely belong to the purely literary history. Tlie first volume of his History of Ewjland had appeared ( 1 754), but had not succeeded. The second v/as just comijig out. Richardson was still giving laws to his little seraglio of adoring .vomen; Fielding had died (1754), worn out by labour and dLsipa^ion ; Smollett was active in the literary ji|< • 48 SA.MUEL JOHNSON. LCHAP. trade, but not in such a way as to increase lus own dignity or that of l)is oinployineat ; Gray was slowly writing a few lines of exquisite verso in his retirement at Cambridge ; two young Irish adventurers, Burke and Goldsmith, were just coming to Loudon to try their fortune ; Adam Smitli made his first experiment as an author- by reviewing the Didionartj in the Edlnhurgh Review ; Eobertson had not yet appeared as a historian ; Gibbon was at Lausanne repenting of his old brief lapse into Catholicism as an act of undergraduate's folly ; and Cowpcr, after three years of " giggling and making giggle" with Tluirlow in an attor- ney's office, was now en.ered at the Temple and amusing himself at times with literature in company Avith such small men of letters as Colman, Bonnell Thornton, anJ Lloyd. It was a slack tide of literature ; the generation of Pope had passed away and left no successors, and no Avritcr of the time could b(* put in competition witli tlie giant now known as " Dictionary Johnson." When the last sheet of the Dictionary had been carried to tlie publislicr, jMillar, Johnson asked the messenger, " What did he say ? " " Sir," said the messenger, " he said, ' Thank God I have done with him.' " " I am glad," replied Johnson, "that he thanks God for anything." Tliankfulness for relief from seven years' toil seems to have been Johnson's predominant feeling : and he was not anxious for a time to take any new labours upon his shoul- ders. Some years passed which have left few traces either upon his personal or his literary history. He contributed a good many reviews in 1756-7 to the Literarij Magazine, one of which, a review of Soame Jenyns, is amongst his best performances. To a weekly paper he contributed for two years, from April, 1758, to April, 17G0,aset of essays called the Idler, on the old Ramhler plan. Ho did some n.J LITERARY CAREER. 49 small literary cobbler's work, receiving a guinea for a prospectua to a newspaper and ten pounds for correcting a volume of poetry. He had advertised in 1756 a new edition of Shakspearo which was to appear by Christmas, 1757 : but he dawdled over it so unconscionably that it did not appear for nine years ; and tlien only in const- quence of taunts from Churchill, who accused him with too much plausibility of cheating his subocribcrs. Ho for subscribers baits liis hook j And takes yoar cash : but whoro's the book P No matter wlioro ; wise fear, you know Forbids the robbing of a foo ; But what to serve our private ends Forbids the cheating of our friends ? In truth, his constitutional indolence seems to have gained advantages over him, when the stimulus of a heavy task was removed. In his meditations, there are many comi>laints of his " sluggishness " and resolutions of amendment. "A kind of strange oblivion has spread over me," he says in April, 17G4, "so that I know not what has become of the last years, and perceive that incidents and intelligence pass over me witliout leaving any wpression." ?' ooems, however, that he was still frequently in c;,..;....ities. Letters are preserved showing that in the beginning of 175G, Richardson became surety for him for a debt, and lent him six guineas to release him from arrest. An event which happened three years later illustrates his position and character. In January, 1759, his mother died at the age of ninety. -Tohnson wa^ unable to come to Lfchfield, and some deeply pathetic letters to her and her stepdaughter, who lived with her, record his emotions. Here is the last sad farewell ujx)ii the snapping of the most sacred of human ties. 8* 'V ■ i if fj i ■ I ilk I ) RO SAMUEL JOUNSON [0HA>. "Jcar Honouicd Jlotlier," he says in a lettei enclosed to Lucy Porter, the step-daugliter, " iieithei your condition nor your charr.>iter make it lit for u»e to say much. You liavo Leon the Lost niotlior, and I beliove the best woman in tlie Avorld. I thank you for your in- dulgence to me, and beg forgiveness of all that I have done ill, and of all that I have omitted to do "well. God f;!rant you His Holy Spiiit, and receive you to everlasting happiness for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen, Lord Jesus receive your spirit. I am, dear, dear mother, "Your dutiful son, " Samuel Johnson." m h ' Jolinson managed to raise twelve guineas, six of them borrowed from his jn-inter, to send to his d}ing mother. In order to gain money for her funeral expenses and some Biuall debts, ho wrote the story of Ram-Jas. It Avas composed in the evenings of a single Aveek, and sent to press as it was written. He received £100 for this, perha})S the most successful of his minor writings, and £25 for a second edition. It was widely translated and universally admired. One of the strangest of literary coincidences is the contemporary appearance of this work and Voltaire's Candide ; to Avhich, indeed, it bears in some respects so ritroug a resemblance that, but for John- son's apparent contradiction, wo Avould suppose that he had at least heard some desci'iption of its design. The two stories, though widely differing in tone and style, are among the most powerful expressions of the melancholy produced in strong intellects by *he Sadness and sorrows of the world. The literary excellence of Candide has secured for it a wider and more enduring popularity than has fallen to the lot of Johnson's fai heaAier production. But I1.J LITERARY CAEEEE. 61 RasKelas is a Look of singular force, and bears ihe most charauteristic iiii])rerfsion of Jolmson'a peculiar tempera- ment. A groat cliaiigo Avas ai)proaching in Jolmson's circura- slauces. Wlien George III. came to the throne, it struck i3ome of his advisers tliat it would be well, as Iiusw(ill puts it, to open " a new and brighter prospect to men of literary merit." This commendable design was carried out by oilering to Johnson a pension of three hundred a year. Considering that such men as Horace "Walpole and iiiii like were enjoying sinecures of more than twice as maw^ thousands for being their father's sons, the bounty does not strike one as excessively liberal. It seems to have been really intended as some set-olf against other pensions bestowed upon various hangers-on of the Scotch prime minister, Bute. Jolmson was coupled with the con- temptible scribbler, Shebbeare, vdio had lately been in the pillory for a Jacobite libel (a " he-bear" and a " she-bear," said the facetious newsjiapers), and when a few months afterwards a pension of £200 a year was given to the old actor, Sheridan, Johnson growled out that it was time for him to resign liis own. Somebody kindly repealed the remark to Sheridan, who would never afterwards speak to Johnson. The pension, tliough very welcome to Johnson, who seems to have been in real distress at the time, suggested some difiiculty. Jolmson had unluckily spoken of a pen- sion in his Dictionary as "generally understood to mean pay given to a State hireling for treason to his country." He was assured, however, that he did not come within the deHnition ; and that the leward was given for what he had done, not for anything that he was expected to do. After some hesitation, Johnson consented to accept the 16 D2 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [chap 11 3 payment thus offered without tlie direct sugf:;csticin of any obligation, though it was prubanly calculated that lie would in caso of need, he the more ready, as actually happened, to use his pen in defence of authority, lie had not coiupronu'sed liis independence and might fairly laugh at angry comments. " I wish," he said afterwards, " that my pension were twice as large, that they might make tv.-ico as much noise." *' I cannot now curao the House of Hanover," was his phrase on another occasion : " hut I think that the pleasure of cursing the House of Hanover and drinking King James's health, all amply overhalanced by three hundred pounds a year." In truth, his Jacobitism was by this time, whatever it had once been, nothing more than a humorous crotchet, giving opj)ortunity for the expression of Tory prejudice. " I hope you will now purge and live cleanly like a gentleman," was Leauclerk's comment upon hearing of his friend's accession of fortune, and as Johnson is now emerging from Grub Street, it is desirable to consider what manner of man was to be presented to the widei- c'itdesi that wen opening to receive hicA. ii,' [chap {n.] JOHNSON AND HIS FEIENDS. 63 ■1). •'.r CHArTER III JOHNSON AND DIS FRIENDS. It is not till some time after Johnson had come into the enjoyment of his pension, that v,g first see him through the eyes of competent observers. The Johnson of our knoM'ledgo, the most familiar figure to all students of Eiiglisii literary historj'- had already long passed the prime of life, and done the greatest part of his literary -work. His character, in the common phrase, had been " formed " years before ; as, iiv^oed, peojde's characters are chiefly formed in the cradle ; and, not only his character, but the habits ■svhich are learnt in the gr(^at schoolroom of the world were fixed beyond any possibility of change. The strange eccentricities Avhich had now become a second nature, amazed the society in '<\liich he was for over twenty years a prominent figure. Unsympathetic ob- servers, those 'jspccially to whom the Chestorfiel '. type represented the ideal of humanity, Avere simply disg'isted or repelled. The man, they thought, might be in his place at a Grub Street pot-house; but had no business in a lady's drawing-room. If he had been modest and retiring, they might have put up with his defects ; but Johnson was net a person whose qualities, good or bad, were of a kind to be ignored. Katurally enough, the fashionable world cared little for the rugged old giant. 64 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [(•HAJ> .U. , it I.I III "The great," said Joliiisou, "haJ tried him and given him up ; thoy liad scon eiiougli of liim ; " and liis reason was ]>retty much to the puiijorfe. " Great lords and great ladies don't lovo to hiiVH tlieir mouths stopped," especially not, one may add, hy an unwashed fiat. It is easy to hlame them now. Evcryhody can sec that a .saint in beggar's rags is intrinsically better than a sinner in gold lace. ]]ut tlio principle is one of those which serves ns for judging the dead, much more than for regulating our own conduct. Those, at any rate, may throw the first stone at the lioraco Walpoles aud Chester- fields, who are quite certain that they would ask a modern Johnson to their houses. The trial would bo severe. Poor .Mrs. Boswell complained grievously of her husband's idolatry. " I have seen many a bear led by a iiian," she said ; " but I never before saw a man led by a bear." The truth is, as Eoswell explains, that the sage's uncouth habits, such as turning the candles' heads dcnvnwards to make them burn more brightly, and letting the wax drop upon the carjjct, "could not but be disagreeable to a lady." lie had other habits still more annoying to people of delicate perceptions,, A hearty despiser of all affectations, ho despised especially the aifectatiou of indilference to the pleasures of the table. " For my j)art," he said, " I mind my belly very studiously and veiy carefully, for I look upon it that he who does not mind his belly will hardly mind anything else." Avowing this principle he would innocently give himself the airs of a scientific epicure. " I, madam," he said to the terr<.v of a lady with whom he was about to sup, " who live at a variety of good tables, am a much better judge of cookery than any person who has a very tolerable cook, but lives much at home, for his palate is gradually adapted to the taste of ni.3 JOHNSON AND IIIS FllIENDS. 63 his cook, wherona, madam, in trying by a wider range, T can moro exquisitely judge." ]iut his pretensions to exquisite taste are by no moans borne out by independent witnesses. " He lauglis," said Tom Davies, " like a rhinoceros," and lio seems to have eaten like a wolf — savagely, silently, and -with undiscriminating fury. IIo was not a pleasant object during this performance, lie was totally absorbed in the business of the moment, a strong perspiration came out, and the veins of his forehead swelled. Ifo l.kcd coar.se satisfying dishes — boiled pork and veal-pie stuffed with plums and sugar ; and in regard to wine, he seems to have accepted the doctrines of the critic of a certain fluid professing to be port, who asked, " What more can you want ? It is black, and it is thick, and it makes you druidc." Claret, as Johnson put it, " is tlie liquor for boys, and port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy." lie could, however, refrain, though he could not be moderate, and for all the latter part of his life, from 17C(3, he was a total abstainer. Nor, it should be added, does ho ever appear to have sought for more than exhilaration from Avine. His earliest intimate friend, Hector, said that he had never but once seen him drunk. His appetite for more innocent kinds of food wfs equally excessive. He would eat seven or eight peaches before breakfast, and declared that he had only once in his life had as much wall-fruit as he wished. His con- sumption of tea was prodigious, beyond all precedent. Hawkins quotes Bishop liurnet as having drunk sixteen large cups every morning, a feat which would entitle him to be reckoned as a rival. *' A hardened and shameless tea- drinker," Johnson called himself, who "with tea amuses the evenings, Avith tea solaces the midnights, and with tea I .) ' f 66 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [chap hi I wplcompfi the iiionii'n!L;s." One of his tcnpota, proscrved hy a relic-hunter, contained two quarts, and he professed to have consumed five and twenty cups ;.t a sitting. Poor Mrs. Thralo conii)Iain3 tliat he often kept her up making tea for liiiu till four in tho morning. His reluctance to go tn IkmI was duo to the fact that his niglits were periods of intonso misery ; but tho vast potations of tea can scarcely have tended to improve them. The huge frame was clad in tlio rnggodost of garments, until his acnuaintaneo with tho Thrales led to a jiartial reform. His wigs were generally hurnt in front, from his shortsighted knack of reading with his head close to the candle ; and at the Thrales, the butler stood ready to eflect a change of wigs as he passed into the dining-room. Once or twice we have neeounts of his bursting into un- usual .splendour. He aj^eared at the first representation of Jmie in a scarlet waistcoat laced with gold ; and on one of his first interviews with Goldsmith he took the trouble to array himself decently, because Goldsmith was reported to have justified slovenly liabits by the precedent of the leader of his craft. Goldsmith, judging by certain famous suits, seems to have inotited by the hint more than his I)receptor. As a rule, Johnson's apjiearance, before ho become a pensioner, was worthy of the proverbial manner of Grub Street. Beauclerk use d to describe bow he had once taken a Trench lady of distinction to see Johnson in his chambers. On descending the staircase they heard a noise like thunder. Jcihnson was pursuing them, struck by a .sudden sense of the demands upon bis gallantry. He brushed in between Icauclerk and the lady, and seizing lier hand conducted her to her coach. A crowd of peo})le collected to stare at the sage, dressed in rusty brown, -with fl pair of old shoes for slippers, a shrivelled wig on the top i « 1 [chap in.] JOHNSON AND UIB FRIENDS. of liis liciul, niid with Bhirtslocves uiiJ the Inoos of his breeches hanging looso. In thoso days, clcr-ynitu nnd physicians -wt'io only just ahniuloning the use of tlitir ofiicial costunio in tho strceta, and Jolmson'a slovenly huluts were even more nuukeil than they W(jultl Lo at present. "I have no passion for clean linen," lie oncu remarked, nnd it is to be feared that ho must sometiiuefl liavo oifended more senses than one. In spite of his uncouth habits of dress and manners, Johnson claimed and, in a sense, with justice, to be a polite man. " 1 look upon myself," he said once to Bos- well, "as a very polite man." He could show the stately courtesy of a sound Tory, who cordially accepts tho prin- ciple of social distinction, but has far too strong a sense of self-respect to fancy that compliance with the ordinary conventions can possibly lower his own position. liank of tho spiritual kind was especially vencrablt', to him. " I should as soon have thought of contradicting a bi-shop," was a phrase which nuuked the highest conceivable degree of defert'uce to a man whom he respected. Kobody, again, could pay more effective compliments, when he pleased ; and the many female friends who have written of him agree, that ho could be singularly attractive to women. Women are, perhaps, more inclined than mc n to forgive external roughness in consideration of the great el Arm o deep tenderness in a thoroughly masculine nature. A characteristic phrase was his remark to Miss Monckton. Sh3 had declared, in opposition to one of Johnson's pre- judices, that Sterne's writings were pathetic : " I am sure," she said, " they have aflected me." " Why," taid Johnson, smiling and rolling himself about, "that is because, dearest, you are a dunce !" When she mentioned thJB to him some time afterwards he replied : " Madam, if I had I! I*, % 31 ■ I '>>■. : Li 'II nn BAMUKL JOUNSON. [chap. tViouqht eo, I ccrtiiinly should not have said it." Thetnith could nut 1)0 more noatly put. J5n9\v(;ll notes, with Koiiic Hiirpriso, that wlion Johnson dined with Lord ^Fonhoddo luj insi.stod upon rising when the lad it','- Id't tho tablt;, and took occasion to observe that politcnesH was " iictitiotis benevolence," and eipially useful in common intercourse. iJoswell's surprise seems to imli- cate that Scotclimen in those days were oven greater bears than Johnson, lie always insisted, as Miss Reynolds tells us, upon showing ladies to their carriages througli Dolt Court, though his dress was such tluit her readers would, she thinks, be astonislied that any man in Ids senses should have shown himself in it abroad or even nt home. Another odd indication of J(dinson's regard for good man- ners, so far as his lights would take him, was tho extreme disgust with which he often referred to a certain footman in Paris, who used his fingers in place of sugar-tongs. Su far as Johnson could recognize bad manners lie was polite enough, though unluckily the limitation is one of con siderable importance. Johnson's claims to politeness were sometimes, it is true, put in a rather etartling form. " Every man of any educa- tion," ho once said to the amazement of his hearers, " would rather be called a rascal than accused of deficiency in the graces." Gibbon, who was present, slily in,.|Uired of a lady whethr r among all her acquaintance she could not fiiul one exception. According to^Irs. Thrale, he went even further. Dr. Earnard, he said, was the only man who had uver done justice to his good breeding; "and you may observe," he added, " that I am well-bred to a degree of needless scrupulosity." He proceeded, according to Mrs. Thrale, but the report a little taxes our faith, to claim uie virtues net only of respecting ceremony, but of nevfli ,n.J JOHNSON AND UI8 FllIKNDS. pontr.iiHcting or Inli' filing his liourcra. It it iath«r oili tlittt Dr. IJiuiiiinl liad ouco a sharp ultcrcutiou v ith Juhn- eon, ami avengfd hiiUHcIf by a sarcnstio copy ol verst'Ji in which, after proi'ta.-sing to learn porfuctness iVoui ditrcr'ii; fiii'uJs, lie Hays, — JohriHiJii pbnll tench mo how to plnro, In varii'd li^;;lit, each boiTowM grncn ; From liiiii I'll learn to write j Copy his olciir familiiir style, Ami hy till' roiif,'lin('ssi of his file, Ciruw, like hiinselt', pi^lito. Johnson, on this as on niatiy occasion'', repented of t)ie Mow as soon as it wa.s stimk, and sat down by J]arnatd. " literally smoothing down his arms and knees," and he- -ecching pardon. Larnard accepted his apologies, b;',t went home and wrote his little copy of verses. Johnson's shortcomings Ih 'ivility were no doubt dno. in piirt, to ilie narrowD ss of Jiiti faculties of perception. He did not know, for "le "onld !;> », see, that his uncouth gestures and slovenly dior-a were lifensive ; and he was not so well able to observe • tiers as to shako oif the man- ners contracted in Grub Street. It is h.ird to study a manual of etiquette late in life, and for a man of Johnson's imperfect facultit;s it was probably impo.ssible. Errors c-f tliis kind were always pardonable, and arc now simply ludicrous. But Johnson often shocked his companions by more indefensible conduct. He was irascible, overbearing, and, when angry, vehement beyond all propriety. He was a " tremendous companion," said Garrick's brother; and men of gentle nature, like Charles Fox, often shrank from Ids company, and perhaps exaggerated his brutality. Johnson, who had long regarded conversation as th( chief amusement, came in later year.'- to regard it as almost E 11 111 ll ^ 1 ~ ■ m y ■ !- m »:i M' U ' z • m f M 7* 1 I 1 r y 'i I •! , k 60 SAMUEL JOUNSON. [chap. the cliiof eniplojmnit of life ; and he had studied the art with tlie zeal of a man innsuiiig w' «4 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [CHAH ; 'v the ground that it sjjoke too favourably of the cliaractei of tho deceased. Johnson i)aid frequent visits to LichficM, to keep up his old friends. One of them was Lucy Porter, liis wife's dauglitcr, witli wlioui, according to ]\Iis3 Seward, ho had been in luve before he married her mother. He was at least fcentlerly attached to hor tlirougli life. And, for the most part, tlie good people of Lichlield seem to have been proud of tlicir fellow-townsman, and gave him a substantial proof of their syinpatliy by continuing to hiui, on favourable terms, the lease of a house originally grantcnl to his father. There was, indeed, one remarkable exception in ]\Iiss Seward, who belonged to a genus specially contemptible to the old doctor. She was one of tho fine ladies who dabbled in poetry, and aimed at being the centre of a small literary circle at Lichlield. Her letters are amongst the most amusing illustrations of the petty adectations and squabbles charactteristic of such a provincial cli(|ue. She evidently hated Johnson at the bottom of her small soul ; and, in- oced, though Johnson once paid her a preposterous com- pliment — a Aveakness of Avhich this stern moralist was apt to be guilty in the company of ladies — he no doubt trod pretty roughly upon some of her pet vanities. By far the most celebrated of Johnst)n's Lichfieldfriendg was David Garrick, in regard to whom his relations were somewhat peculiar. Eeynolds said that Johnson con- sidered Garrick to bo his own property, and would never allow hira to be ]iraiscd or blamed by any one else without contradiction, lleynolds composed a pair of imaginary tlialogues to illustrate the proposition, in one of which Johnson attacks Gairick in answer to Reynolds, and in the other defends liim in answer to Gibbon. The dialoguea eeem to be very good reproductions of the Johnsonian HI.] JOHNSON AND HIS FRIENDS. r>5 manner, though perhaps the courteous Iveynolds wa£ a little too much impressed by its roughness ; and tliey probably include many genuine remarks of JohnsDu's. It is remarkable tbat the praise is far more pointed and elaborate than the blame, -which turns chiclly upon tho general inferiority of an actor's position. And, in fact, this seems to have corresponded to Johnson's opinii)u aljout Garrick as gathered from BoswelL The two men had at bottom a considerable regard for each other, founded upon old association, mutual services, and reciprocal respect for talents of very different orders. lUit they were so widely separated by circumstances, as well as by a radical opposition of temperament, that any closo intimacy could hardly be expected. The bear and tho inonkey are not likely to be intimate friends. Garrick's rapid elevation in fame and fortune seems to have pro- duced a certain degree of envy in his old schoolmastei-, A grave n\oral philosopher has, of course, no riglit to look askance at the rewards which fashion lavishes upon men of lighter and less lasting merit, and which he professes to despise. Johnson, however, v.as troubled with a ratlxji excessive allowance of human nature. Moreover he had tlie good old-fashioned contempt for players, characteristic both of the Tory and the inartistic mind. He asserted roundly that he looked upon players as no better than dancing-dogs. " But, sir, you will allow that some players are better than others?" " Yes, sir, as some dogs dance better th 'in others." So when Goldsmith accused Garrick of grossly flattering tho cpieen, Johnson exclaimed, " And as to meanness — how is it mean in a player, a showman, a Mlow who exhibits himself for a shilling, to flatter his cpieen 1 " At another time Bosw(3ll suggested that we might respect a great player. ' What ! sir," exclaimed Johnson, " a Vil' Ih't Hi: CiJ BAMUEL JOHNSON. [CDAr. f-llow who clai.s a hunii) upon his back and a lump on his li;,' ani cries, * I am Richnr,! lUn Xay, sir, a ballad- sin.ucr is a liigher man, for he does two tilings : he repeats iuid lie sings; thme is both recitation and music in his pfiibrmance— the i)layer only recites." Such sentiments were not very likely to remain un- known to Garrick nor to put him at ease with Johnson, whom, indeed, ho ahvrys suspected of laughing at luju. They had a little lilf on account of JohnsonV. Kdillon of 8haksi)eare. Frora some misunderstanding, loliucon did not make use of G;!.rrick's collection of old pl.ti-s. John- w,.i!, it seems, thought that Garrick should have coartiid him more, and perhaps sent the plays to Lio house; whereas Garrick, knowing that -lohnson treated books with a roughness ill-sr.ited to tb. if constitution, tliought that he had done quite enough by P/king Johnson" to ccme to his library. 'W^. revenge- -if it was reven^^e— taken by Johnson was to say nothing of Garrick in' his Preface, and to glance obliquely at his non-eoramuiucation ot iiis ruivies. He . .■ ems to have thought that it would be a lowtriug of fcihakspeare to admit that his fame owed any thin.'.; ',o Gai'ick's exertions. Ko.s\reil innoo<'ntly communicated to Garrick a criticism of Johnson's upon one of his poems I'd sinilo with tho simple and feed with tlie poor. •' Let me smile with the wise, and feed with the rich," was Johnson's tolerably harmless remarlc. Garrick, how- ever, did not like it, and when Eoswell tried to consoio him by saying that Johnson gored everybody in turn, and added, "famum hahet iii cornu." "Ay," said Garrick Vtthemently, " he has a whole mow of it." Jti i:x.] JOHNSON AND HIS FBIENDS. 61 Tho most unpleasant incident was when G-irricx proposed rather too freely to be a member of tho Club. Johnson said that the first duke in England had no right to use puch language, and said, according to ]\Irs. Thrale, " If Garrick does apply, I'll blackball him. Surely we ought to be able to sit in a society like ours — ' Unelbowcd by a gamester, pimp, or player I ' " Nearly ten years afterwards, however, Johnson favoured his election, and when he died, declared that tho Club should have a year's widowhood. No successor to Garrick was elected during that time. Johnson sometimes ventured to criticise Garrick's acting, but here Garrick could take his full revenge. The pur- blind Johnson was not, we may imagine, much of a critic in such matters. Garrick reports him to have said of an actor at Lichfield, " There is a courtly vivacity about the fellow '" when, in fact, said Garrick, " he was the most vulgar ruffian that ever went upon boards." In spite of such collisions of opinion and mutual criticism, Jolmson seems to have spoken in tlio highest terms of Garrick's good qualities, and they had many pleasant meetings. Garrick takes a prominent part in two or three of the best conversations in Boswell, and seems to have put his interlocutors in specially good temper. Johnson declared him to be " the first man in the world for sprightly conversation." He said that Dryden had written much better prologues than any of Garrick's, but that Garrick had written more good prologues than Dryden. He declared that it was wonderful how little Garrick had been Sjioilt by all the flattery that he had received. No wondei if he was a little vain : *' a man who is perpetually flattered 17 I ill 1 ,# ' ■■•< 1 '1 ; ■ \ m 68 BAilUEL JOHNSON. [CBAP. I ( ? •01 r'l in every niodo Hint can bp conceived : so many bellows have blown tlieliicl, llmtone wonders ho is not by this timubecuino a cinder ! " " If all tin's had happened to mo," ho said on another occasicn, " I should have had a coiiplo of fellows with long poles walking before mo, toknock down everybody that stood in the way. Consider, if all this had happened to Cibber and Quin, they'd have jumped over the moon. Yet Ganiek speaks to us," smiling. lie admitted at the same time that (Janiek had raised the i)rofossion of a player, lie defended Garrick, too, against the common charge of avarice. Garrick, as ho pointed out, had been brought up in a family who.-;e study it was to make four- pence go as far as fourpence-halfpeniiy. Johnson remem- bered in early days drinking tea witli Garrick when Peg AVodingtun made it, and made it, as Garrick grumbled, " as red as blood." iJut when Garrick became rich he became liberal. He had, so Johnson declared, given away more money than any man in England. After Garrick's death, Johnson took occasion to say, in the Lives of ihe Poets, that the death "had eclipsed the gaiety of nations and diminished the public stock of harm- less pleasures." Eoswell ventured to criticise the observa- tion rather spitefully. " Why nations ? Did his gaiety extend further than his own nation 1 " " Why, sir," replied Johnson, " some imagination must be allowed. Besides, we may say nutions if we allow the Scotch to bo a nation,' and to have gaiety— which they have not." On the whole,' in spite of various drawbacks, Johnson's reported observa- tions upon Garrick will appear to bo discriminative, and yet, on the whole, strongly favourable to his character. Yet we are not quite surprised that Mrs. Garrick di-I not respond to a hint thrown out by Johnson, that he would be glad to write the life of 'lig friend. Vim 1 t. !?. II 1. 3 JOHNSON AND HIS FUI^:NDS. (39 At OxfdfJ, Jolmsan ac(inired tho fi-icii Isliip of Br. Adams, afterwards i^^astc^ of Pembroke and author of a onoo well-known reply to Hume's argumont upon miracles lie was an amiable nun, and was proud to do tho honours of tho university to his old friend, wlion, in later yoars, Johnson rovisitod tiio muchdoved scenes of his neglected youth. Tlio warinUi of Johnson's regard for old days is oddly illustrated by an interview recorded by Coswell with one Edwards, a fellow-student whom ho met again in 1778, not having previously seon him sinco 1729. Thoy had lived in London for forty yoars without onco meeting, a fact more surprising tlion than now. Boswell ea^'erlv gathered up the little scraps of college anecdote which tho meeting produced, but perhaps his best find was a phrase of Edwards himself. " You are a philosopher, Dr. John- son," ho said ; " I have tried, too, in my time to bo a philosopher; but, I don't know how, cheerfulness was always breaking in." The phrase, as Loswell truly says, records an exquisite trait of character. Of the friends who gathered round Johnson during hia period of struggle, many had vanished before he became well known. The best loved of all seems to have been Dr. Bathurst, a physician, who, ftiiling to obtain practice, joined the expedition to Havannah, and fell a victim to tho climate (1762). Upon him Johnson pronounced a pane- gyric which has contributed a proverbial phrase to the language. " Dear Bathurst," ho said, " was a man to my very heart's content : ho hated a fool and he hated a rogue, and he hated a Whig ; he was a very good hater" Johnson remembered Bathurst in his prayers for years after his loss, and received from him a peculiar legacy. Francis Barber had been the negro slave of Bathurst's father, who left him his liberty b}' will. Dr. Bathurst allowed him to entei I % \ '* • A, * m m ,'i I i n ill 70 SAMUEL JOHNSON. [OHAJ n \i \' i ji^ V, V^ ! i t Johnson's servico ; and Johnson sent him to school at con- sidtTablo oxpeiisc, and af'tervvnrds retained him in hi? servico witli little interruption till his own death. Once r>:irl)er ran away to sea, and was discharged, oddly enough, by the good oHices of Wilkes, to whom Smollett applied on Johnson's behalf. ]inrl)er becamo an important membci of Johnson's family, some of whom reproached him for his liberality to Iho n5c?c;er. No ono over solved the great pi blem as t" 'viiM ,1 'iios were rendered by IVtibor to liis mast .ViMsn . • wns "as impenetrable by a comb a.s a quick.sft liedge," and whoso clothes were never touched by the bi iish. Among the other friends of this period must be reckoned his biographer, Hawkinc, in attorney who was alterwards Chairman of ...j i\iiadiusex Justices, and knighted on presenting an address to the King. Boswell regarded poor Sir Juhn Hawkins with all tho animosity uf a rival author, and with some spico of wounded vanity. lie was grievously ollended, so at least says Sir John's daughter, on being described in tho Life of Johnson as " Mr. James I>osAvell " without a solitary cjiithet such aa celeltrated or well-known. If that was rc;il]y his feeling, ho hi:d his revenge ; for no one book ever so 8Ui)pressed anotlier as Boswell's Life sup ■•ressed Hawkins's. In truth. Hawkins was a solemn prig, remarkable chiefly for the unusual intensity of his conviction that all virtue consists in resi ^ctability. He had a special aversion to " goodness of heart," which he regarded as another name for a quality properly called extravagance or vice. John^^^ou's tenacity of old acquaintance introduced him into the vj.'ib, where he made himself so dibagreeable, especiuliy, as it stems, by rudeness to Burke, that he fo nd it ext-edient to inrent a pretext for i iguaiLn. Job son callc I him a "very un- m.] JOHNSON AND HIS FRIENDS. 71 clubahlo man," and may perlmpa liave inUiulcd him in the quaint description : " I really heliovo him to be an honest man at tho bottom ; thou;^'!), be sure, he id rather penurious, and he is somewhat in ; md it must bo owned I'.o has some degree of brutality, id is not without a ten- dency to .savageness that canuut, v;eli bo defended." In a list of Johnson's friouda it is proper to men tion Eichardson and Hawkesworth. Eiehardson seems to have given him substantial help, and was repaid by favourable compaiisons with Fielding, scarcely borne out by tho verdict of i^stcrity. "ridding," . lid Johnson, "could tell the hour by looking at tho clock; whil.-^t Richardson know how the clock was luatle.' " There is more knowledge of tho heart," ho said at another timo, " in ono letter of Eichardson's than in all Tom Junes.'* Johnson's preference -jf the sentimentalist to the man whose humour and strong sense were so liko his own, shows how much his criticism wan biassed by his prejudices j though, of course, Eichardson's exti -lal decency was a recommen- dation to tho moralist, liawkesworth's intimacy with Johnson seems to havo been chiefly in tho period between the Didionanj and tho pension. lie was considered to be Jolinson's best imitator ; and has vanished liko other imi- tators. His fate, very doubtful if tlu; story believed at the time be true, was a curious ono for a friend of Johnson's. He hail made some sceptical remarks as to the efficacy of prayer in his preface to the South Sea Voyages ; and was so bitterly attacked by a " Christian" in tho papers, that he destr' ved himself by a dose of opium. 1 vouiiger friends, who became disciples of the sage Boon ,u r tl'n appearance of the RnnbleVy are prominent figures in iiic later circle. One of these was Bonnet Lang ton, a man of good family, fine scholarship, and very II a I IP |-;f is I i i i HI i 12 SAMUEL JOUNSON. [chap. aniablo chnractor. His oxccedingly tall nnrl slender fignre Was compared by Jk-st to tlio stork in Kaplmd'a carter, ii of the Miraculous I)rauj,'lit of Fislica. Uks Hawkins dcscriboa him sitting with one leg twisted round tho other as though to occupy the smallest possible space, ani;t like a serpent?" To wliich tioswoU rei)lie'.l with charming irrokivanco, "Johnson ia :he Ilerculus wlio sUvm.^lod serpents in his craillo." The last of Goldsmith's liiti was suggested by Johnson's sliaking Jiia sides with laughter hccauso Goldsmith admirci the skill with wldch the little fishes in the fable were made to talk in character. " Why, Dr. Johnson, this is not so easy as you seem to think," was the retort, " for if you were to make little fishes talk, they would talk like whales." In spite of sundry little sparrings, Johnson fully appre- ciated Goldsmith's genius. Possibly his authority hastened the spread of public appreciation, as he seemed to claim, whilst repudiating Boswell's too flattering theory that it hud materially raised Goldsmith's position. When Ueynoltls quoted the authority of Fox in favour of the TrtiirUer, saying that his friends might suspect that they had been too partial, Johnson replied very truly that the Traveller was beyond the need of Fox's praise, and that the partiality of Goldsmith's friends had always been against him. They would hardly give him a hearing. "Goldsmith," he added, "was a man who, wdialcver he wrote, always did it better than any oilier man could do." Johnson's settled opinion in fact was tiiat embodied in the famous epitapli with its "nihil tetigit quod non ornavit," and, though dedications are perhaps the only literary product more generally insincere than e^jitaphs, we may believe that Goldsmith too meant what ho said in the dedication of She Stoops to Conquer. "It may do me some honour to inform tho public that I have lived many years in intimacy with you. It may serve the interosta of mankind also to inform tliem tliat the greatest wit may be found in a character, without impairing the most un< dfected piety." III.l JOHNSON AND HIS FBIENDS. 81 Thonj-h Jdluisoii was tlms rich in fricn^l.ship, two con- nexions have still to bo noticed wliich had an exceptional bearing upon his fame and happiness. In January, 1705, ho made tho acquaintance of the Thiales. Mr. Thralo W.IS the proprift)!- of tho brewery which afterwards became tliat of IJarcIay and rerkins. Ho was married in 17G3 to a x>[is3 Hester Lyncli Salisbury, who has l,ocomo celebrated from her friendship with Johnson.' Slio was a woman of great vivacity and independenco of character. She had a sensitive and passi.mato, if not a very tender nature, and enough literary culture to appreciato Johnson's intellectual power, and on occasion to play a very respect- able part in conversation. She hid far more Latin and English scholarship than fell to the lot of most ladies of her day, and wit enough to preserve her from 'legenerating like some of the " blues," into that most ofrensive of beings-a feminine prig. Her marriage had been one of convenience, and her husband's want of sympathy, and jealousy of any interference in husinor-s matters, forced her, she says, to take to literature as her solo resource. " No wonder," , she adds, - if I loved my books and children." It is, perhaps, moro to be wondered at that her children seem to have had a rather subordinate place in her alfections. The marriage, however, though not of tho happiest, was perf.;ctly decorous. [Mrs. Thralo dis- charged her do;.icstic duties irreproachably, even when she seems to have KA some real cause of complaint. To the world she eclipsed her husband, a solid respectable man, whoso mind, according to Johnson, struck the hours very regularly, though it did not raark tlio m< antes. • Mrs. Thralo was bom iu 1710 or 17 >. TUrale waa born in 1724, probsbly the laiter. 4 J ^ f ' 1 1'. ^ -f L-( I '; SAMUEL JOHNSON. [i'HAP The Thralos were introduced to Johnson by theii conunon friend, Aitliur ^rurjjliy, an actor and dramatist, who afterwards liecanie the editor of Johnson's Avurkt). One day, when ^ailing ujjon Jolinson, tlioy found liim in su(.h a lit of despair that Thrale tried to stop liis moutli by ])laciiig Ins hand hefuro it. The pair tlien joined in hogging Johnson to leave his solitary abode, and come to them at their country-house at Streatham. He complied, and for the next sixteen years a room was set apart for him, both at Streatham and in their Iiouso in Southwark. He passed a laigo part of his time with them, and derived from the intimncy most of the comfort of his later years. He treated ]\Ir.s, Thrale Avilh a kind of paternal gallantry, her age at the time of their acquaintance being about twenty-four, and his iifty-livo. lie generally called her by the playful name of " my mistress," addressed little poems to her, gave her solid advice, and gradually came to con- fide to her his miseries and ailments with rather surprising frankness. She flattered and amused him, and soothed his sull'erings and did something towards humanizing his rugged exterior. There was one little grievance between them which requires notice. Johnson's i)et virtue in private life Avas a rigid regard for truth. He spoke, it Avas said of him, as if ho Avas always on oath. He Avould not, ibr example, allow his servant to use the phrase " not at home," and even in the heat of conversation resisted the temptation to give point to an anecdote. The lively ]\rrs. Thrale rather fretted against the restraint, and Johnson admonished her in vain. He complained to Boswell tliat ehe Avas Avilling to have that said of her, Avhich the best of mankind had died rather than have said of tliem. Bosv.X'll, the faithful imitator of his master in this respect, delighted in taking up the parable. "Now, madam, givt in.] JOHNSON AND HIS FRIENDS. 88 mo leave to catch you in tlie fact," ho said on one occasion j " it waa not an old woman, but an old man whom I mentioned, as having told mo this," and he recounts his check to tho " lively lady " witli intense complacency. As may bo imagined, Boawell and INIrs. Tliralo did not love each otlier, in spite of the well-meant ellbrts of tlio sago tr bring about a friendly feeling between his discii)l.'s. It is time to close this list of friends with the inimitable Boswell. James Bos\. .;, born in 1740, was tho eldest son of a Whig laird and lord of sessions. He had acquired somo English friends at the Scotch universities, among whom must bo mentioned Mr. Temple, an English clergy- man. Loswell's correspondence witli Temple, discovered years after his death by a singular cliance, and published in 1857, is, after tho Life of Johnson, one of tho mo.st curious exhibitions of character in tho language. iJo^well was intended for tho Scotch bar, and studied civil law at Utrecht in tho winter of 1762. It was in tho following summer that he made Johnson's acquaint anco. Perhaps the fundamental quality in EosweH's character was his intense capacity for enjoyment. He was, as j\Ir. Carlylo puts it, " gluttonously fond of whatever would yield him a little solacement, were it only of a stomachic character." His lovo of good living and good drink would have made him a hearty adnurer of his countryman, Burns, had Burns been famous in Bosweli's youth. Is7 body could have joined with more thorough abandonmeju in the chorus to tho poet's livehest songs in praise of love and wine. He would have made an excellent fourth when " Willie brewed a peck of malt, and Eab and Allan came to see," and the drinking contest for the Whistle comme. morated in another lyric would have excited his keenest interest. He was always delighted when he conld o-et 18 " '1 : )1 'Mf- M n \'\ 84 BAMUL JOHNSON. [CHAF. " I I. n Johnsi^n to discuss the etliics and staiiatii s of drinking. '•I am myseli'," ho says, "a lover of wine, and tliortlbrt curious to hear Avhatcvcr is romaricaLle cojioerniDj? drink- ing." Tho remark is apropos to a story of Dr. Campbell drinking thirteen bottles of port at a sitting. Lost this slnnild seem incredible, he fjuotes Julinson's dictum. " Sir, if a man diinlcs very slowly and lets ono glass evaporate before ho takes another, I know not how long he may drink." lioswell's faculty for making love was as great aa his power of drinking. His letters to Temple record with amusing frankness tho vicissitudes of some uf his courtsliips and the versatility of his passions. Boswell's tastes, however, woro by no means limited to sensual or frivolous enjoyments. His appreciation of the bottle was combined -with an orpially hearty sensibili to more intellectual pleasures. Ho had not a spark of philo- sophic or poetic power, but within the ordinary range oi such topics as can be discussed at a dinner-party, ho had an abundant share of liveliness and intciligonco. His p,.late was as keen for good talk as for good wine. Ho was an admirable recipient, if not an originator, of shrewd or humorous remarks upon life and manners. What in regard to sensual enjoyment was mere gluttony, appeared in higher matters as an insatiable curiosity. At times thi.i faculty Vooanie intolerable to his neighbours. "I will not be 1 ui ,d with what and why," said poor Johnson, ono '! ly in desperation. "Why is a cow's tail long'} Why k a fox's tail bushy 1 " " Sir," said Johnson on another tiucasion, when Boswell ■was cross-examining a third person about him in his presence. "You have but two subjects, yourself and me. I am sick of both." Boswell, however, was not to bo repelled by such a MUirt iw this, or even by ruder rebull'a. Once when di» [CHAV. ni.] lOHKSON AND HIS FB/KNDB. 85 long 1 f that hn <1i I aassiug thn means of getimg a friend to leave liOndon, Johnson said in rovengo luv a provious offenco. " Xivy, sir, we'll send you to him. If your presence doesn't drive a man out of Ids house, nothing will." Do \vell waa "horribly slinrkod," hut he still stuck to his victi • like a leech, and pn i into i^^ minutest details of li"^ iiiuuncrs. Ih- observtu .iih conscientious accu. though Johii .n abstained froui milk one lUst-dnN aot reject it wlifn put in his cup. He notes the whistliu^H and pufliiic^'s, the trick of saying " too-too-too " of his idol : and it was a proud day when In; won a bet by venturing to ask Johnson what ho did w ith certain Rrrapt d bits A orai'^e-pcel. His curiosity was not satisfied on this occasion ; but it would have made him the prince of interviewers in these days. Js'othing d lishto' him so much as rubbing slioulders with any fau; person. He ?^craped acquaintance with ^ Rousseau, and Paoli, as well as with ]M gotten heroine of the Newgate CaleiuUu '• notorious ,1', Wesley, lludd, a for- IIo was as eager to talk to Hume the scejjtic, or Wilkes the dema- gogue, to the orthodox Tory, Johnson; and, if repelled, iL was from no deficiency in daring. In 17G7, ho took advantage of his travels in Corsica to introduce lumseLf to Lord Chatham, then Prime Minister. The letter moderately ends by asking, ^^ Could your lonhhip find time to honour mo mm and then icith a letter ? I have been told how favourably your lordsliip has spoken of mo. To correspond with a Paoli and with a Chatham is enough to keep a young man ever ardent in thy pursuit of virtuous fame." N"o other young man of the day, we may bo euro, woiUd have dared to make such a proposal to the majestic orator. His absui-d vanity, and the greedy craving for notoriety \n I II Mj'