Apostles, aiming 'tis like at me,' says Bunyan, because I was a tinker; to which I answered that I also had read of priests and Pharisees that had their hands in the blood of our Lord.' Aye, was the rejoinder, and you are one of those Pharisees, for you make long prayers to devour widows' houses. 'I answered,' says Bunyan, that if he had got no more by preaching and praying than I had done, he would not be so rich as now he was.' This ended in his committal to Bedford jail, there to remain till the quarter sessions. He was offered his liberty if he would promise not to call the people together, but no such promise would he make; and when he was told that none but poor, simple, ignorant people came to hear him, he replied that such had most need of teaching, and therefore it was his duty to go on in that work. It appears, however, that after a few days he listened to his friends, and would have given bond for his appearance at the sessions: but the magistrate to whom they applied was afraid to take it. Whereat,' says Bunyan, I was not at all daunted, but rather glad, and saw evidently that the Lord had heard me. For before I went down to the justice, I begged of God that if I might do more good by being at liberty than in prison, that then I might be set at liberty; but if not-His will be done; for I was not altogether without hopes, but that my imprisonment might be an awakening to the saints in the country: therefore I could not tell which to choose; only I in that manner did commit the thing to God. And verily at my return, I did meet my God sweetly in the prison again, comforting of me, and satisfying of me that it was His will and mind that I should be there.'" pp. lix, lx.

The concluding sentences of this extract depict the whole of Bunyan's carriage in the matter. Dr. Southey has abstracted the narrative very fairly, except that he keeps back the name and degree of the person, who, while the mittimus was making out, " entered into discourse," as he mildly phrases it, but, as Bunyan words it, 'fell to taunting me with reviling terms," namely, a certain Dr. Lindale, apparently the clergyman of the parish, or of some neighbouring one. It was delicate in the Laureate to throw the matter into decent generalities; but we see nothing that is to be gained by mystification. Bunyan remarks upon his own retort to Dr. Lindale's unjust sneer about devouring widows' houses, " But that Scripture coming into my mind, Answer not a fool according to his folly,' I was as sparing of my speech as I could without prejudice to truth." Had he continued to try his hand at retort, poor Dr. Lindale would have been no match for him.-But to proceed :

6

"Some seven weeks after this the sessions were held, and John Bunyan was indicted as a person who devilishly and perniciously abstained from coming to church to hear Divine service, and who was a common upholder of several unlawful meetings and conventicles to the great disturbance and distraction of the good subjects of this kingdom.' He answered that as to the first part of this he was a common frequenter of the Church of God: but being demanded whether he attended the parish church, he replied that he did not, and for this reason, that he was not commanded so to do in the word of God; we were commanded there to pray, but with the spirit, not by the common prayer book, the prayers in that book being made by other men, and not by the motion of the Holy Spirit within our own hearts. And as to the Lord's prayer, said he, there are very few that can, in the Spirit, say the two first words of that prayer; that is, that can call God their father, as knowing what it is to be born again, and as having experience that they are begotten of the Spirit of God; which if they do not, all is but babbling.' Having persuaded himself by weak arguments Bunyan used them as if they had been strong ones; 'Shew me,' he said, the place in the Epistles where the Common Prayer Book is written, or one text of Scripture that commands me to read it, and I will use it. But yet, notwithstanding, they that have a mind to use it, they have their liberty; that is, I would not keep them from it. But for our parts, we can pray to God without it. Blessed be his name!' But the sectaries had kept their countrymen from it, while they had the power; and Bunyan himself in his sphere laboured to dissuade them from it." pp. lx, lxi.

If he did, prejudiced and misguided as we think him to have been in so doing, it was no reason for sending him to prison, keeping him twelve years in durance, and threatening him with banishment or a halter. But in truth there were many reasons why Bunyan might, at that time, have felt some distaste to the prayer-book; not for its own sake, but viewing it as the party-badge of the lay Wingates and the clerical Lindales of the age. His prejudices against the book itself, and against forms of devotion in general, were unworthy of his powerful understanding; but we can

allow much for an unhappy association of ideas, at a time when party-spirit ran high, and the abettors of the prayer-book did not always take care to adorn their faith by their works. But the real grievance was, that the book was unhappily forced upon the people by severe pains and penalties. Bunyan expressly states in the above passage, that he did not wish to interfere with the liberty of those who approved it, only he asked the same liberty for those who thought they would pray to God without it. This liberty ought to have been granted; and had it been, we should not have seen so many men of Bunyan's stamp goaded into hostility to the Established Church, which has never recovered the shock of those unwise measures. Bunyan's remark upon the Lord's Prayer was not gratuitous, as it would appear in Dr. Southey's abstract, but arose out of a question of Justice Keeling's, who was constrained to add consentingly, after the words, "All is but babbling," above extracted, “That is a truth.”

Dr. Southey, in retailing this conversation, goes on, as already noticed, to complain, and we think very unfairly, of Bunyan's want of reason and tolerance in these examinations, while he omits to tell us how disgracefully the magistrates taunted their prisoner, by saying that he was possessed of a devil, that his god was Beelzebub, and that his religious dialect about having the comfortable presence of God-blessed be his holy name," was cant and pedlar's French;" on which mildly adds Bunyan in his note-book, "The Lord open his eyes."

"Some farther disputation ensued: we were told,' he said,' to exhort one another daily, while it is called to day:' but the justice replied he ought not to preach. In rejoinder he offered to prove that it was lawful for him and such as him to preach, and quoted the Apostle's words, As every man hath received the gift, even so let him minister the same unto another.' Let me a little open that Scripture to you, said the magistrate: As every man hath received his gift; that is, as every man hath received a trade, so let him follow it. If any man have received a gift of tinkering as thou hast done, let him follow his tinkering. And so other men their trades, and the divine bis calling.' But John insisted that spiritual gifts were intended in this passage. The magistrate said men might exhort if they pleased in their families, but not otherwise. John answered, if it were lawful to do good to some, it was lawful to do good to more. If it were a good thing to exhort our families, it was good to exhort others. And if it were held a sin for them to meet together and seek the face of God, and exhort one another to follow Christ, he would sin still.' They were now at a point. You confess the indictment then? said the magistrate. He made answerthis I confess : We have had many meetings together, both to pray to God, and to exhort one another; and we had the sweet comforting presence of the Lord among us for our encouragement; blessed be his name! there I confess myself guilty, and no otherwise. Then said the magistrate hear your judgment! You must be had back again to prison, and there lie for three months following; and at three months' end, if you do not submit to go to church to hear Divine service, and leave your preaching, you must be banished the realm. And if after such a day as shall be appointed you to be gone, you shall be found in this realm, or be found to come over again without special license from the king, you must stretch by the neck for it: Itell you plainly.' Bunyan resolutely answered that if he were out of prison to-day, he would preach the Gospel again to-morrow, by the help of God!'

"Back therefore he was taken; and I can truly say,' he says, 'I bless the Lord for it; that my heart was sweetly refreshed in the time of my examination, and also afterwards at my returning to the prison, so that I found Christ's words more than bare trifles, where he saith, He will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries shall not be able to gainsay nor resist.' Three months elapsed, and the clerk of the peace then went to him by desire of the magistrate to see if he could be persuaded to obedience. But Bunyan insisted that the law, being intended against those who designed to do evil in their meetings, did not apply to him. He was told that he might exhort his neighbours in private discourse, if he did not call together an assembly of people; this he might do, and do much good thereby, without breaking the law. But, said Bunyan, if I may do good to one, why not to two? and if to two why not to four, and so to eight, and so on? Aye, said the clerk, and to a hundred, I warrant you! Yes, Bunyan answered, I think I should not be forbidden to do as much good as I can. They then began to discuss the question whether under pretence of doing good, harm might not be done, by seducing the people, and Bunyan allowed that there might be many who designed the destruction of the government. let them,

he said, be punished, and let him be punished also should he do any thing not becoming a man and a Christian; if error or heresy could be proved upon him he would disown it, even in the market place; but to the truth, he would stand to the last drop of his blood. Bound in conscience he held himself to obey all righteous laws, whether there were a king or not; and if he offended against them patiently to bear the penalty. And to cut off all occasion of suspicion as touching the harmlessness of his doctrines, he would willingly give any one the notes of all his sermons, for he sincerely desired to live in peace and submit to the present authority. But there are two ways of obeying,' he observed; the one to do that which I in my conscience do believe that I am bound to do, actively; and where I cannot obey actively, there I am willing to lie down, and to suffer what they shall do unto me.' And here the interview ended, Bunyan thanking him for his civil and meek discoursing,' and breathing a wish that they might meet in heaven." p. lxi-lxiii.

To our minds, this passage tells highly to Bunyan's honour. He is anxious to live in peace; he is loyal, affectionate, and obedient as a subject; he is willing to exhibit the notes of all his discourses, in proof that they contained nothing contrary to the laws of God or man; he feels it his duty to submit to the civil magistrate; and even in case of a command which appears to him contrary to the word of God, and which, therefore, he cannot in conscience actively obey, he is content, without resistance or murmuring, to bear the penalty of his non-compliance; thus carrying his views of passive obedience to the very utmost extent contemplated by Laud, or Sacheverell, or the non-jurors themselves. He did not indeed think that he had really broken the law of the land; for he tells us in the passage abridged by Dr. Southey, that he argued that matter at large with the clerk of the peace; nor would he entertain, he says, so much uncharitableness of Queen Elizabeth's parliament, or of the queen herself, as to believe that the act passed in the thirty-fifth of her reign, under which he was accused, was intended" to oppress any of God's ordinances, or the interrupting any in the way of God;" that law, he maintained, did not apply to his case; its preamble confined it to those who, "under colour or pretence of religion," went about to "drive at mischief, making religion only their cloak," which could not refer to private meetings solely for spiritual purposes; and he adds, that if the privacy of the meetings were objected to, he should most gladly have them public, if that were permitted. We pause not to inquire into the legal argument, or the moral logic: but taking these either way, of the rectitude of the feelings and intentions of Bunyan there can be no doubt; and we are, therefore, not pleased at Dr. Southey's representing him as going out of his way most preposterously to set himself up for a martyr. Our Laureate should feel some tenderness for the conscientious scruples of a man who submitted for twelve years to imprisonment and innumerable hardships; for what he solemnly believed to be an act of religious duty, in the discharge of which he considered he was promoting the salvation of his fellow-creatures, and committing no offence either before God or man. When the clerk of the peace told him he would be transported beyond seas, "into Spain or Constantinople, or some other remote part of the world,” he only replied with exemplary meekness: "I shall desire, in all godliness and honesty, to behave myself in the nation whilst I am in it; and if I must be so dealt withal as you say, I hope God will help me to bear what they shall lay upon me. I know no evil that I have done in this matter to be so used; I speak as in the presence of God."

Dr. Southey goes on as follows with the narrative :

"Shortly afterwards the coronation took place, and the proclamation which allowed persons to sue out a pardon during twelve months from that day, had the effect of suspending the proceedings against him, if any farther were intended. When the assizes came, his wife presented a petition to the Judges that they would impartially take his case into consideration. Sir Matthew Hale was one of these Judges, and expressed a wish to serve her if he could, but a fear that he could do her no good; and being assured by one of the Justices that Bunyan had been convicted, and was a

speak.'

hot-spirited fellow, he waved the matter. But the high sheriff encouraged the poor woman to make another effort for her husband before they left the town; and accordingly with a bashed face and a trembling heart,' she entered the Swan Chamber, where the two Judges and many magistrates and gentry of the country were in company together. Trembling however as she was, Elizabeth Bunyan had imbibed something of her husband's spirit. She had been to London to petition the House of Lords in his behalf, and had been told by one whom she calls Lord Barkwood that they could do nothing, but that his releasement was committed to the Judges at these next assizes, and now I am come to you she said, and you give neither releasement, nor relief! And she complained to Hale that he was kept unlawfully in prison, for the indictment was false, and he was clapped up before there were any proclamations against the meetings. One of the Judges then said he had been lawfully convicted. It is false,' replied the woman: for when they said to him do you confess the indictment, he said only this, that he had been at several meetings both when there was preaching the word and prayer, and that they had God's presence among them.' Will your husband leave preaching? said Judge Twisden; if he will do so, then send for him. 'My Lord,' said she, he dares not leave preaching as long as he can "Sir Matthew himself was not likely to be favourably impressed by this sort of pleading. But he listened sadly when she told him that there were four small children by the former wife, one of them blind; that they had nothing to live upon while their father was in prison, but the charity of good people; and that she herself 'smayed' at the news when her husband was apprehended, being but young and unaccustomed to such things, fell in labour, and continuing in it for eight days was delivered of a dead child. Alas, poor woman! said Hale. But Twisden said poverty was her cloak, for he understood her husband was better maintained by running up and down a-preaching, than by following his calling. Sir Matthew asked what was his calling, and was told that he was a tinker. Yes, observed the wife, and because he is a tinker and a poor man, therefore he is despised and cannot have justice. The scene ended in Sir Matthew's mildly telling her he was sorry he could do her no good; that what her husband had said was taken for a conviction, and that there was no other course for her than either to apply to the king, or sue out his pardon, or get a writ of error, which would be the cheapest. She urged them to send for Bunyan that he might speak for himself: his appearance however would rather have confirmed those in their opinions who said that there was not such another pestilent fellow in the country, than have moved the Judges in his favour. Elizabeth Bunyan concludes her account by saying, this I remember, that though I was somewhat timorous at my first entrance into the chamber, yet before I went out I could not but break forth into tears; not so much because they were so hard hearted against me and my husband, but to think what a sad account such poor creatures will have to give at the coming of the Lord!' pp. lxiii-lxv.

Judge Hale appears throughout this singular dialogue in a truly amiable and honourable aspect. In the original narrative, we find him patiently giving Elizabeth Bunyan the best legal advice, notwithstanding the hard words and palpable injustice of the other judges; and it is clear to our minds that he thought Bunyan illegally treated, and that the other judges felt this to be his opinion or suspicion. Judge Chester "seemed to be in a chafe," and "scratched his head with anger;" and Judge Twisden said Bunyan's doctrine was "the doctrine of the devil," and almost insulted Judge Hale for his patient attention to the poor woman's suit. Dr. Southey passes over this, while he ungenerously remarks that Bunyan's appearing would only have confirmed the judges in their opinion, that he was "the most pestilent fellow in the country." This observation were more worthy of Judge Twisden than of Laureate Southey; and we also doubt its truth; for Bunyan's evident honesty and simple homely bearing, to say nothing of his Christian spirit and powerful eloquence, must have prejudiced any right-minded man in his favour; as was the case wherever he was known even his jailor trusting him to do what he liked, and to go where he pleased, till an order from the magistrates interfered with this licence, and detained him for many a long year, a strait and hopeless prisoner. Elizabeth Bunyan's whole conduct is admirable: she was -and that is saying much indeed—a wife worthy of such a husband; and if the narrative of her journey to London, her conferences with "Lord Barkwood" and others, and her whole proceeding during Bunyan's deten

tion, were recoverable, we doubt not it would form a detail of domestic heroism and female affection and constancy worthy of the pen of a Walter Scott. Dr. Southey thinks that Sir Matthew Hale was not likely to be favourably impressed with her mode of pleading in favour of her husband. We can only say that we pity both his heart and his head if he was not. Her argument was two-fold; first, that her husband had committed no civil offence, his preaching having reference merely to spiritual concerns and the salvation of souls; and secondly, that he had not been legally convicted even of the offence charged against him. The first, Hale could not interfere with as a judge, whatever he might feel as a man; but in reference to the second, he recommends to her three legal courses, one of which, a writ of error, he urges as the cheapest: but this he would hardly have done if he had been quite sure in his own mind that it would have ended in renewed expense and disappointment. He most carefully avoids stating his own belief of the technical legality of the conviction; though the point is pressed upon him by the other judges. He seems to have been mystified or overruled by his colleagues, and to have given up the matter by no means with peaceful feelings. We cannot believe that he concurred with Dr. Southey that a few years' imprisonment, with or without cause, was so salutary a medicine that it was a pity to deprive the poor man of it. For thus avers our poet :

"Without reference to human laws, it may be affirmed that the circumstances which removed this high-minded and hot-minded man from a course of dangerous activity, in which he was as little likely to acquire a tolerant spirit, as to impart it, and placed him in confinement, where his understanding had leisure to ripen and to cool, was no less favourable for his moral and religious nature than it has ultimately proved to his usefulness and his fame." p. lxvi.

Woe to all Westmorland Methodist itinerants, all Whigs, Liberals, Dissenters, and Evangelicals, if our excellent Laureate should ever become the state physician; for though he might not with his own proper hands lock them up each and severally for twelve years in a prison, yet if any good vigorous magistrate will do it for him, a panegyric will not be wanting from his well furnished pen in honour of so salutary a measure. Oh it is good state discipline and excellent British liberty to shut up all alleged "high-minded and hot-minded " Methodists, and so forth, in prison; more especially with a view to teach them "a tolerant spirit," and to "ripen their understanding" and "improve their moral and religious nature." The Church of Rome teaches these lessons even better than our Laureate ; and the Inquisition in Spain and Portugal exceeds the wisdom and tolerance of the Star-chamber itself. What a pity Dr. Southey had not been born three centuries ago, to assist the worthy Dr. Bonner in teaching men "a tolerant spirit," and "improving their moral and religious nature" in his celebrated coal-house.

We have dwelt so long upon these notices of Bunyan that we shall be obliged to omit some other matters which we had intended for the succeeding departments of our present Number; but our rule has always been, when a subject appeared to us fraught both with interest and utility, not to hurry it over, as if we thought our readers estimated a book not by the quality but the number of its articles, and would feel displeased if their intellectual food were not served up in the form of mince-meat. Having therefore gone thus far, we must advance a little farther by following Dr. Southey to the conclusion of his narrative.

After twelve years' confinement, when the Pilgrim's Progress had made some noise, and Bunyan's meek and exemplary conduct had gained him many friends, he was liberated; his proto-biographer, Doe a Baptist minister, says at the instance of Dr. Barlow, Bishop of Lincoln; but Mr. Ivimey adduces a passage from a preface to Dr. Owen's Sermons, which