Predicted Troubles.

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blood, striving against sin:" let the kingdom be always before you, and believe steadfastly concerning things that are invisible: let nothing that is on this side the other world get within you: and, above all, look well to your own hearts, and to the lusts thereof, for they are "deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked." Set your faces like a flint; you have all power in heaven and earth on your side.

They do thank him for

his exhorta

tion.

Chr. Then Christian thanked him for his exhortation; but told him, withal, that they would have him speak further to them for their help the rest of the way; and the rather, for that they well knew that he was a prophet, and could tell them of things that might happen unto them, and also how they might resist and overcome them. To which request Faithful also consented. So Evangelist began as followeth :

He predicteth

what troubles they shall meet with in Vanity Fair, and encourageth

them to steadfastness.

Evan. My sons, you have heard, in the words of the truth of the gospel, that you must through many tribulations enter into the kingdom of heaven; and, again, that in every city bonds and afflictions abide you and therefore you cannot expect that you should long go on your pilgrimage without them, in some sort or other. You have found something of the truth of these testimonies upon you already, and more will immediately follow: for now, as you see, you are almost out of this wilderness, and therefore you will soon come into a town that you will by-and-by see before you; and in that town you will be hardly beset with enemies, who will strain hard but they will kill you: and be you sure that one or both of you must seal the testimony which you hold with blood; but be you faithful unto death, and the King will give you a crown of life. He that shall die there, although his death will be unnatural, and his pain perhaps great, he will yet have the better

120

He whose lot it will be there to suffer, will have the better of his brother.

Vanity Fair.

of his fellow; not only because he will be arrived at the Celestial City soonest, but because he will escape many miseries that the other will meet with in the rest of his journey. But when you are come to the town, and shall find fulfilled what I have here related, then remember your friend, and quit yourselves like men; and commit the keeping of your souls to your God in well-doing, as unto a faithful Creator.

Then I saw in my dream, that when they were got out of the wilderness, they presently saw a town before them, and the name of that town is Vanity; and at the town there is a fair kept, called Vanity Fair. It is kept all the year long. It beareth the name of Vanity Fair, because the town where it is kept is lighter than vanity; and also because all that is there sold, or that cometh thither, is vanity: as is the saying of the wise, All that cometh is vanity" (Eccles. i.; ii. 11, 17; xi. 8; Isa. xl. 17.

of this fair.

This fair is no new-erected business, but a thing of ancient standing: I will show you the original of it. Almost five thousand years agone, there were pilgrims walking to the Celestial City, as these The antiquity two honest persons are; and Beelzebub, Apollyon, and Legion, with their companions, perceiving by the path that the pilgrims made, that their way to the city lay through this town of Vanity, they contrived here to set up a fair,—a fair wherein should be sold all sorts of vanity; and that it should last all the year long. Therefore at this fair are all such merchandise sold, as houses, chandise of lands, trades, places, honours, preferthis fair. ments, titles, countries, kingdoms, lusts, pleasures; and delights of all sorts, as harlots, wives, husbands, children, masters, servants, lives, blood, bodies, souls, silver, gold, pearls, precious stones, and what not.

The mer

Tis Streets and Rows.

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And, moreover, at this fair, there is at all times to be seen juggling, cheats, games, plays, fools, apes, knaves, and rogues, and that of every kind.

Here are to be seen, too, and that for nothing, thefts, murders, adulteries, false-swearers, and that of a bloodred colour.

And as, in other fairs of less moment, there are the several rows and streets, under their proper names, where such and such wares are vended; so here likewise you have the proper places, rows, streets (viz., countries and kingdoms), where the wares of this fair are soonest to be found. Here is the Britain Row, the French Row, the Italian Row, the Spanish Row, the German Row, where several sorts of vanities are to be sold.

The streets of this fair.

But, as

in other fairs, some one commodity is as the chief of all the fair, so the ware of Rome and her merchandise is greatly promoted in this fair; only our English nation, with some others, have taken a dislike thereat.

Christ went

fair.

Now, as I said, the way to the Celestial City lies just through this town where this lusty fair is kept; and he that will go to the city, and yet not go through this town, must needs 'go out of the world" (1 Cor. v. 10). The Prince of princes himself, when here, went through this town to his own country, through this and that upon a fair-day too: yea, and, as I think, it was Beelzebub, the chief lord of this fair, that invited him to buy of his vanities; yea, would have made him lord of the fair, would he but have done him reverence as he went through the town. Yea, because he was such a person of honour, Beelzebub had him from street to street, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a little time, that he might, if possible, allure that Blessed One to cheapen and buy some of his vanities; but he had no mind to the merchandise, and therefore left the town, without laying out so much as one far

in

Christ bought nothing this fair.

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A Hubbub, and its Causes.

thing upon these vanities (Matt. iv. 8, 9; Luke iv. 5-7). This fair, therefore, is an ancient thing, of long standing, and a very great fair.

The pilgrims enter the fair.

entered into

The fair in ahubbub about them.

First, The

The first cause of the hubbub.

Now these pilgrims, as I said, must needs go through this fair. Well, so they did; but, behold, even as they the fair, all the people in the fair were moved, and the town itself as it were in a hubbub about them; and that for several reasons: for,

The

pilgrims were clothed with such kind of. raiment as was diverse from the raiment of any that traded in that fair. people, therefore, of the fair made a great gazing upon them (1 Cor. iv. 9). Some said they were fools; some, they were bedlams; and some, they were outlandish men.

Second cause of the hubbub.

Secondly, And as they wondered at their apparel, so they did likewise at their speech; for few could understand what they said. They naturally spoke the language of Canaan; but they that kept the fair were the men of this world: so that, from one end of the fair to the other, they seemed barbarians each to the other (1 Cor. ii. 7, 8). Thirdly, But that which did not a little amuse the merchandisers was, that these pilgrims Third cause set very light by all their wares. They cared not so much as to look upon them; and if they called upon them to buy, they would put their fingers in their ears, and cry, "Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity" (Ps. cxix. 37); and look upwards, signifying that their trade and traffic was in heaven (Phil. iii. 20, 21).

of the hubbub.

Fourth cause of the hubbub.

One chanced, mockingly, beholding the carriage of the men, to say unto them, What will ye buy? But they, looking gravely upon him, said, We "buy the truth" (Prov.