The Pilgrim's Progress

The list is a short one.

Robinson Crusoe, Aesop's Fables, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, Weems' Life of Washington, and a History of the United States.

When everything else had been read, he resolutely began on the revised statutes of Indiana, which Dave Turnham, the constable, had in daily use, but permitted him to come to his house and read.

Though so fond of his books, it must not be supposed that he cared only for work and serious study.

So let me conclude everything with the words of John Bunyan.

In one of the most beautiful parts of the Pilgrim's Progress, he is describing the end of one of his best and his holiest pilgrims.

He said, And after this it was announced that Mr. Valiant for truth was taken with a summons by the same post as the other, and had this for a token that the summons was true, that the picture was broken at the fountain.

And when he understood it, he called for his friends and he told it to them.

In an earlier tract, he had thought briefly of the similarity between human life and a pilgrimage, and he now worked this theme out in fascinating detail, using the rural scenery of England for his background, the splendid city of London for his Vanity Fair, and the saints and villains of his own personal acquaintance for the finely drawn characters of his allegory.

The Pilgrim's Progress is truly the rehearsal of Bunyan's own spiritual experiences.

He himself had been the, quote, man clothed in rags, with his face from his own house, a book in his hand, and a great burden upon his back, end quote.

After he had realized that Christ was his righteousness, and that this did not depend on, quote, the good frame of his heart, end quote, or, as we should say, on his feelings, quote, now did the chains fall off my legs indeed, end quote.

His book was at first received with much criticism from his Puritan friends, who saw in it only an addition to the worldly literature of his day, but there was not much then for Puritans to read, and it was not long before it was devoutly laid beside their Bibles and perused with gladness and with profit.

It was perhaps two centuries later before literary critics began to realize that this story, so full of human reality and interest, and so marvelously modeled upon the English of the King James translation of the Bible, is one of the glories of English literature.

In his later years, he wrote several other allegories, of which one of them, The Holy War, it has been said that, quote, If the Pilgrim's Progress had never been written, it would be regarded as the finest allegory in the language, end quote.

During the later years of his life, Bunyan remained in Bedford as a venerated local pastor and preacher.

Family worship was common in many a home.

The Bible and Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress were the books most frequently read.

Good Friday was not in their calendar, and the many fast days which human authority originated they did not recognize.

Nor need we wonder at this.

Family worship was common in many a home.

The Bible and Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress were the books most frequently read.

Good Friday was not in their calendar, and the many fast days which human authority originated they did not recognize.

Nor need we wonder at this.

Yeah.

And I was like, "Dude, I love it." That's the Pilgrim's Progress guy, um, John Bunyan.

He was, like, illiterate.

He became a-

Such a proverbial philosophy as honesty is the best policy, necessity never made a good bargain, fish and visitors smell in three days, God heals and the doctors take the fees, keep your eyes open before marriage and half shut afterwards, to bear other people's afflictions, everyone has courage enough and to spare, savored of a blended irony and cynicism exceedingly attractive to men of the world and wise old women, even in New England parishes, whatever Calvinistic ministers might say of the higher life.

The sale of the almanac was greater than that of the Pilgrim's Progress, and the wealth of Franklin stood out in marked contrast with the poverty of Bunyan a century before.

The business enterprise of the gifted publisher at this time was a most noticeable thing.

He began to import books from England and to print anything that had money in it, from political tracts to popular poems, from the sermons of Wesley to the essays of Cicero.