was a book that at once became a whole literature for the common man. It was filled with stories, with homely incidents that illustrated great moral truths, and with wisdom for every day. England became a church. Every man had his Bible as a guide for his thought and conduct. He needed no interpreter, for religion became simple; the possession not of a professional class, doctors, lawyers, churchmen, but of ordinary men and women. The language of every day became saturated with phrases and words taken from this source. Most of all, the sense of sin, of the struggle between good and evil that goes on in a man's soul, became a fact of every day thinking. Worldly standards became less important,-the magnificence of kings and courtiers, the deeds of knights of chivalry, the romantic ideals of the stories about Arthur. In the sight of God, a king was no greater than a plowman, and was to be tried by the same standards.

Though it did not appear until near the end of the century, Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress well illustrates some of the characteristics of the Puritans. The author, a poor tinker, had been brought up on the Bible; his great book is written in the same simple language that we find in the King James Version. The Pilgrim's Progress has been the most widely read book in England excepting only the Bible. When he was a lad, John Bunyan saw visions of heaven and heard heavenly voices. He struggled with deep conviction of sin. He and his little family lived in the greatest poverty; they possessed almost nothing. He became a preacher, and at length was thrown into prison because he did not uphold the state religion. For eleven years he was in jail, his companions.

being men like himself, imprisoned because the government thought them dangerous. "The parting with my wife and poor children," he wrote, "hath often been to me in this place like the pulling of flesh from the bones, and that not only because I am somewhat too fond of these great mercies, but also because I should often have brought to my mind the many hardships, miseries, and wants that my poor family was like to meet with should I be taken from them, especially my poor blind child who lay nearer my heart than all besides."

After eleven years he was set free. He had spent much time, when in prison, in writing tracts, sermons, and stories. The following selection, from The Pilgrim's Progress, expresses the spirit of the Puritan and his view of life.

VANITY FAIR

JOHN BUNYAN

So Evangelist began as followeth :

"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 go long 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 ye 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 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 'tis 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."

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 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, lands, trades, places, honors, preferments, titles, countries, kingdoms, lusts, pleasures, and delights of all sorts, as lives, blood, bodies, souls, silver, gold, pearls, precious stones, and what not.

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

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

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.

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. The Prince of Princes himself, when here, went through this town to his own country, 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 honor, 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 farthing upon these vanities. This fair therefore is an ancient thing, of long standing and a very great fair.

Now these pilgrims, as I said, must needs go through this fair. Well, so they did; but behold, even as they entered into 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

First: The pilgrims were clothed with such kind of raiment as was diverse from the raiment of any that traded in that fair. The people therefore of the fair made a great gazing upon them: some said they were fools, some they were bedlams, and some they were outlandish-men.

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.

Thirdly: But that which did not a little amuse the merchandisers was, that these pilgrims 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," and look upwards, signifying that their trade and traffic was in Heaven.

One chanced, mockingly, beholding the carriages of the men, to say unto them, "What will ye buy?" But they,