SOURCE: Stranahan, Brainerd P. “Bunyan's Satire and Its Biblical Sources.” In Bunyan in Our Time, edited by Robert G. Collmer, pp. 35-60. Kent, Ohio: The Kent State University Press, 1989.

[In the following essay, Stranhan examines Bunyan's use of satire in The Pilgrim's Progress, contending that characters, scenes, and language in Bunyan's work were heavily influenced by Scripture.]

Recently Brean S. Hammond has argued, “In an elastic sense of the term, most of The Pilgrim's Progress is satirical; indeed satire of a kind is the staple diet of the prose.”¹ His essay calls attention to a neglected aspect of John Bunyan's most celebrated work: few commentators portray its author as seeking to reform human conduct through the power of laughter and ridicule. Sometimes they appear uncertain about whether such effects are indeed present; A. Richard Dutton, for example, remarks on the early behavior of Christian's neighbors: “[O]ne might almost be tempted to believe that Bunyan had his tongue in his cheek.” Elizabeth Adeney believes he often does, yet even she concludes that “Bunyan's prose is uneven, in short—not always fully under control and, in the long run, not quite certain of its own attitudes, even in some of the most delightfully comic writing in the book.”²

If we wish to understand John Bunyan, it is always helpful to take suggestions from the Book that guided both him and the true pilgrims of whom he wrote. Our appreciation of satiric elements in The Pilgrim's Progress becomes much clearer if we consider how Bunyan's biblical sources influence the behavior of his characters. With the single exception of the scenes involving Mr. Ignorance, his satire is remarkably consistent in its techniques and faithful to the precedents that were available for him in Scripture. The First Part attacks the conduct of worldly folk who stand under the threat of God's angry judgment; the Second Part criticizes, much more gently, the unwillingness of Christians to accept God's mercy and love.

Bunyan's usual method is to adapt a traditional homilist's device—the exemplum that illustrates the text of a sermon. Again and again, he creates characters and scenes whose concerns are summed up in particular scriptural verses. The Bible at times furnishes only the general suggestion for a particular passage in The Pilgrim's Progress; in other places, its language is incorporated directly into the new story, so that text and illustration become one. Bunyan has no uniform practice for annotating his debts to Scripture; occasionally his marginal commentary (often omitted from modern editions) is overassiduous in sending the reader to his sources, but often he will incorporate a direct quotation without any citation at all.³ However, whether acknowledged or not, his satiric aims and premises are firmly grounded in the Bible.

William Congreve's most famous play provides an apt title for Bunyan's satire in the First Part. The main target is indeed “the way of the world”—as opposed to the way of the faithful followers of Christ. To Bunyan, “the world” is an expression charged with a particular meaning by the early Christian writers. For the King James Version of the Old Testament, “the world” usually means “the whole earth” or “everywhere.” The New Testament, though, employs the term more often in the sense of “this world,” with the implication that another is possible. It is certainly natural that a book entitled The Pilgrim's Progress from this World to That which Is to Come should follow the New Testament's usage and also favor its preference for the second world, as opposed to the present one.

In the First Part, Bunyan's satire incorporates the Bible's evidence about how worldly figures are likely to behave when they encounter Christians—and how they like to behave when they are by themselves. For each of these two main areas of inquiry, he satirizes three kinds of conduct: the world's three reactions to Christians (the true pilgrims), and the three lusts that its adherents prefer to gratify instead of seeking the world to come.

THE WORLD'S THREE REACTIONS TO CHRISTIANS

The New Testament suggests three distinct ways in which worldly people usually respond in the presence of Christians, and all three appear frequently in the First Part of The Pilgrim's Progress. First, and at worst, the followers of Christ can expect physical abuse—imprisonment, torture, exile, or even death—as befell the men of faith in Hebrews 11.37-38 who, like Abraham, “looked for a city … whose builder and maker is God”:

They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented;

(Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

Second, dedicated followers of Christ can expect to receive genuine scorn or even revulsion as a response to their faith, as did the Psalmist in the Old Testament: “All they that see me laugh me to scorn” (22.7). Bunyan follows the argument of the opening chapter of 1 Corinthians, where Paul makes a contrast between Christian and worldly wisdom:

For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. …

For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.

(18-21)

Finally, true believers might merely expect to be laughed at, to be ridiculed by the rest of the world. According to the Book of Acts, Paul personally experienced this third reaction while a prisoner of the Romans:

And as he thus spake for himself, Festus said with a loud voice, Paul, thou art beside thyself; much learning doth make thee mad.

But he said, I am not mad, most noble Festus; but speak forth the words of truth and soberness.

(26.24-25)

These attitudes of worldly persons towards Christians are presented vividly at the start of Bunyan's story, when the man in rags flees to seek “Eternal Life” after learning that he lives in the City of Destruction.⁴ In the figurative meaning of the allegory, that city represents “this world,” while the nondeparture of its inhabitants demonstrates that they prefer it to the uncertain prospect of a world to come. At first, the desire of the man in rags for salvation is diagnosed by his family as an acute case of insanity; as “they thought, that some frenzy distemper had got into his head” (9). Seeing him run from the city, his neighbors react in three distinct ways: “some mocked, others threatned; and some cried after him to return” (10). These responses represent the world's typical and unchanging views about Christians, just as the New Testament describes them, and such views are repeated faithfully throughout the First Part of The Pilgrim's Progress. Christians are either ridiculous (and so should be mocked), dangerous (and thus should be threatened with persecution), or mad (and so should be restrained from their folly). Within the gallery of worldly characters who are encountered by the true pilgrims, let us briefly consider the leading proponents of these attitudes.

After Christian's own family judges him to be insane, his fellow townsmen Obstinate and Pliable reach the same verdict; they overtake Christian with the intention of bringing him back to safety. Obstinate is soon confirmed in his opinion that this fledgling pilgrim has lost his mind: “Come then, Neighbour Pliable, let us turn again, and go home without him; there is a company of these Craz'd-headed Coxcombs, that when they take a fancy by the end, are wiser in their own eyes than seven men that can render a reason” (11).⁵ He is incensed when Pliable is at first inclined to follow Christian's example: “What! more Fools still? be ruled by me and go back; who knows whither such a brain-sick fellow will lead you? go back, go back, and be wise” (12). Pliable's dedication to the way of pilgrimage is extinguished by the Slough of Despond; as he turns away, his final words are a rejection of the world to come: “May I get out again with my life, you shall possess the brave Country alone for me” (14). Since Christian's convictions are based on a Book whose author “cannot lye” (13),⁶ the truly irrational behavior in this scene is that of Obstinate and Pliable.

The people of the town of Vanity have no intention of abandoning their temporal affairs, so it is not surprising that they react to the sight of true pilgrims much as Christian's neighbors did, “some mocking, some taunting, some speaking reproachfully, and some calling upon others to smite them” (90). This episode dramatizes the most hostile of the world's opinions: Christians should be persecuted, even to the point of putting them to death. At first Vanity's citizens also incline to the insanity theory: “they that were appointed to examine them, did not believe them to be any other then [sic] Bedlams and Mad” (91). But when (as happened with Pliable) some are drawn to the pilgrims' cause, and a riot breaks out, the leaders recognize that Christians endanger their worldly business and “that they should die, for the abuse they had done, and for deluding the men of the fair” (92). Testifying at the trial of Faithful, Pickthank puts the issue well:

For he hath railed on our noble Prince Beelzebub, and hath spoke contemptibly of his honourable Friends, whose names are the Lord Old man, the Lord Carnal delight, the Lord Luxurious, the Lord Desire of Vain-glory, my old Lord Lechery, Sir Having Greedy, with all the rest of our Nobility; and he hath said moreover, that if all men were of his mind, if possible, there is not one of these Noble-men should have any longer a being in this Town.

(94)

These names suggest, of course, what the citizens prefer instead of going on pilgrimage.

When the members of the jury are identified during the trial scene, satire in The Pilgrim's Progress reaches a kind of climax in its density of biblical allusions. Nearly all the jurors who condemn Faithful can trace their lineage to a particular biblical passage, and the total weight of Bunyan's catalogue makes a grim commentary on how Christians fare at the hands of worldly tribunals. These townsmen of Vanity exit after hearing the charge of the judge, Lord Hate-good:

Then went the Jury out, whose names were Mr. Blind-man, Mr. No-good, Mr. Malice, Mr. Love-lust, Mr. Live-loose, Mr. Heady, Mr. High-mind, Mr. Enmity, Mr. Lyar, Mr. Cruelty, Mr. Hate-light, and Mr. Implacable, who every one gave in his private Verdict against him among themselves, and afterwards unanimously concluded to bring him in guilty before the Judge.

(96)

Over half of these names seem to have occurred to Bunyan because they appear in biblical texts that denounce unjust legal proceedings. The presiding magistrate's title is found in the King James Version only in Micah 3, which is part of a vigorous denunciation of the ruling authorities of Israel.⁷ This passage also forecasts the cruel execution which is decreed for Faithful at the end of his trial:

And I said, Hear, I pray you, O heads of Jacob, and ye princes of the house of Israel; Is it not for you to know judgment?

Who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones;

Who also eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them; and they break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as flesh within the caldron.

(1-3; emphasis here and in following passages is mine)

Mr. No-good appears to have sprung from Job's complaint about the unjust way in which God allows the present world's magistrates to persecute the innocent:

If the scourge slay suddenly, he will laugh at the trial of the innocent.

The earth is given into the hand of the wicked: he covereth the faces of the judges thereof; if not, where, and who is he?

Now my days are swifter than a post: they flee away, they see no good.

(Job 9.23-25)

On the other hand, the name of Mr. Malice suggests that the innocent ought to endure this ill treatment. The verse before the occurrence of the word in Titus 3.3 anticipates the “meekness and patience” (92) with which Christian and Faithful meet their ordeal:

Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work,

To speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers, but gentle, shewing all meekness unto all men.

For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.

(1-3)

The presence of Mr. Hate-light among the jurymen implies not only that these followers of Christ are innocent, but that it is their accusers who stand condemned by the justice of God:

He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.

(John 3.18-20)

Mr. Implacable's name also suggests that the judgment should really be against the jury. In the King James Version his name is mentioned only in a Pauline catalogue of men who are “Without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them” (Romans 1.31-32).

Mr. Enmity's origin shows that such a worldly jury could bring in only a verdict of death: “For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” (Romans 8.6-7). Mr. Liar is mentioned in 1 Timothy 1.10, which says that God's law nevertheless applies “For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine.” This also suggests the character of the testimony that has been heard at the trial, as does the text in which Mr. Cruelty's nature is described: “Deliver me not over unto the will of mine enemies: for false witnesses are risen up against me, and such as breathe out cruelty” (Psalm 27.12).

The foreman, Mr. Blind-man, probably takes his inspiration from Ephesians 4, which, besides alluding to spiritual blindness, also mentions the name of his home town:

This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind,

Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:

Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.

(17-19)

Mr. Love-lust and Mr. Live-loose may be described in verse 19. They are the only members of the jury who cannot be traced with probability to a particular Scripture. Another origin for them may be among the companions of Mr. Heady and Mr. High-mind, who are listed in 2 Timothy 3 among

Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;

Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.

For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts,

Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.

(4-7)

Surely, being judged by a jury whose members are so steeped in vice and injustice, no honest pilgrim could have expected a favorable outcome for his trial. The savage punishment visited upon Faithful reads like a summary of the principal torments chronicled in Foxe's Acts and Monuments:

They therefore brought him out, to do with him according to their Law; and first they Scourged him, then they Buffetted him, then they Lanced his flesh with Knives; after that they Stoned him with Stones, then prickt him with their Swords, and last of all they burned him to Ashes at the Stake. Thus came Faithful to his end.

(97)

Happily the pilgrims encounter much more frequently the most benign of the world's three reactions—laughter, which proceeds from the conclusion that Christians are the funniest people to be encountered anywhere. Immediately after he had left his great burden at the Cross, Bunyan's hero meets with merriment as he tries to enlighten Formalist and Hypocrisy: “To these things they gave him no answer, only they looked upon each other, and laughed” (41). Perhaps the most striking instance of this attitude in The Pilgrim's Progress, and the most penetrating and subtle refutation of it, comes in the pilgrims' interview with Atheist. By this time, his behavior has become familiar:

CHR.
We are going to the Mount Sion.

Then Atheist fell into a very great Laughter.

CHR.
What is the meaning of your Laughter?
ATHEIST.
I laugh to see what ignorant persons you are, to take upon you so tedious a Journey; and yet are like to have nothing but your travel for your paines.

(135; emphasis in original)

Atheist tells them that, having given up the search for the Celestial City, “I am going back again, and will seek to refresh my self with the things that I then cast away, for hopes of that, which I now see, is not.” The marginal note for this statement is “The Atheist takes up his content in this world” (emphasis in original).

Bunyan is unusually reserved in his satire of Atheist. Christian and his new companion Hopeful seem to realize that the threat personified in this figure is a particularly serious one, and they do not confront him with the fervor that Christian employs against other worldly characters.⁸ Indirectly, however, Bunyan sets out to subvert Atheist's position from the moment of his appearance: “Now after a while, they perceived afar off, one comeing softly and alone all along the High-way to meet them. Then said Christian to his fellow, Yonder is a man with his back toward Sion, and he is coming to meet us” (134). With these words, Atheist has already been branded as a rather peculiar fellow. It is emphasized that he is travelling alone—in contrast even to such false pilgrims as Talkative and By-ends, who seem to have no difficulty in finding companions. And the spiritual geography of Bunyan's book provides an even more telling condemnation. Atheist is walking in the opposite direction from the way to the Celestial City, whereas even Mr. Worldly-Wiseman and the citizens at Vanity Fair stayed in one place and did not increase their distance from the pilgrims' goal.

Atheist is allowed to make what seems a straightforward statement of his present opinion:

CHR.
Why man? Do you think we shall not be received?
ATHEIST.
Received! There is no such place as you dream of, in all this World.

(135)

Yet if “this World” means “the present world”—as it always has in the First Part—then Atheist has simply made a statement with which every true pilgrim can agree. Christian takes his words in the latter sense, replying that there is such a place “in the World to come.” His remarks are confined to such simple affirmations, but an accumulation of quiet ironies continues to undermine Atheist's position. The dialogue of the episode rings with echoes of the eleventh and twelfth chapters of Hebrews:⁹

CHR.
We are going to the Mount Sion. …
But ye are come unto mount Sion. …

(12.22)

ATHEIST.
When I was at home in mine own Countrey, I heard as you now affirm, and from that hearing went out to see, and have been seeking this City this twenty years: But find no more of it, than I did on the first day I set out. … I am going back again. …
For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.
And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly. …

(11.14–16)

HOPE
… Did we not see from the delectable Mountains the Gate of the City?
These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off. …

(11.13)

At the end of the interview, “they turned away from the man, and he, Laughing at them, went his way” (136). Christian and Hopeful are reenacting the journey of the men of faith in Hebrews, whereas Atheist—unlike them—is availing himself of the opportunity to return. The sharp edge of Bunyan's satire can be felt even if the reader does not catch the references to Hebrews. His narrative has already established that the whole of reality is composed of two worlds (or “countries”) rather than one, and that the second can be reached only by those who have rejected the first because of their belief in the one that is still to come.

THE THREE LUSTS OF THE WORLD

Since worldly characters reject the behavior of Christians in the First Part of The Pilgrim's Progress, what do they prefer instead? To answer this basic question, Bunyan's satire takes its direction from one of many New Testament passages that sharply contrast the world's ways with those of Christians:

Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.

(1 John 2.15-17)

Bunyan seems to have understood “the lust of the flesh” as lechery, “the lust of the eyes” as the desire for riches, and “the pride of life” as the desire for rank and ease.¹⁰

Christian runs into these worldly attractions from the very beginning of the story. The fact that the world and its lusts pass away is one reason that his birthplace is called “The City of Destruction.” When he tells two of his townsmen why he has gone off on pilgrimage, one makes his preferences very clear: “What! said Obstinate, and leave our Friends, and our Comforts behind us!” (11). Pliable is briefly attracted by the prospect of the world to come, but he, too, soon opts for a life of comfort. Christian's next acquaintance, Mr. Worldly-Wiseman, hails from the town of Carnal-Policy, which is evidently dedicated to the lust of the flesh. He puts the prospects for pilgrimage in the bleakest terms: “[H]ear me, I am older than thou! thou art like to meet with in the way which thou goest, Wearisomness, Painfulness, Hunger, Perils, Nakedness, Sword, Lions, Dragons, Darkness; and in a word, death, and what not? These things are certainly true, having been confirmed by many testimonies” (18). And he is equally confident about the better alternative: “I could direct thee to the obtaining of what thou desirest, without the dangers that thou in this way wilt run thy self into: yea, and the remedy is at hand. Besides, I will add, that instead of those dangers, thou shalt meet with much safety, friendship, and content” (19). Worldly-Wiseman's views are refuted at length by Evangelist, and in his margin Bunyan cites 1 John: “They are of the world: therefore speak they of the world, and the world heareth them. We are of God” (4.5-6). A better text for the origin of his name is 1 Corinthians 1.19, which links it with Christian's first address: “For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.”

The contrast between this world and the next one is stressed in several of the emblems witnessed by Christian at the Interpreter's House—especially in the scene depicting Patience and Passion, where the treasure sought by the latter turns to rags: “So will it be with all such Men at the end of this world” (31). The next important episode in which Bunyan uses these ideas for satiric purposes is the dialogue that results from the meeting between Christian and Faithful.

In this scene we learn more about the interests and opinions of the world. The influences that have hindered Faithful's own pilgrimage are described as a series of personifications. Before the Wicket Gate, he escaped the clutches of Madam Wanton, who certainly represents one of the world's principal lusts, that of “all carnal and fleshly content” (68). This temptation soon returned in another form, for Faithful's next assailant was Adam the first, who offered in marriage all three of his daughters: “The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life” (69). This Adam is among the first individuals in The Pilgrim's Progress to condemn himself by speaking Scripture; in the passage already quoted from 1 John 2, the names of his daughters describe “all that is in the world.” By obeying another biblical injunction to “put off the old man with his deeds” (Colossians 3.9), Faithful freed himself from the world and its preoccupations (70).

The last and most insistent of his antagonists was Shame—who links the mockery begun by Christian's neighbors with the themes of the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, for he notes that most wealthy and important people avoid going on pilgrimage:

why he objected against Religion it self; he said it was a pitiful, low, sneaking business for a man to mind Religion; he said that a tender conscience was an unmanly thing, and that for Man to watch over his words and ways, so as to tye up himself from that hectoring liberty, that the brave spirits of the times accustom themselves unto, would make him the Ridicule of the times. He objected also, that but few of the Mighty, Rich, or Wise, were ever of my opinion; nor any of them neither, before they were perswaded to be Fools, and to be of a voluntary fondness, to venture the loss of all, for no body else knows what.

(72)

Like the names of the daughters of Adam the first, some of Shame's words come directly from biblical passages that condemn the world. A portion of his last sentence is taken from the end of the first chapter of 1 Corinthians:

For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:

But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty.

(26-27)

Shame is therefore really engaged in a kind of self-mockery: Faithful cannot ridicule the pilgrims for their “unworldliness” without reaffirming the truth of Scripture, which denounces his own worldly point of view. Faithful says that he also remembered another text (Luke 16.15): “But at last I began to consider, That that which is highly esteemed among Men, is had in abomination with God” (73). He is thus able to reject the world's opinions as well.

After their interview with Talkative—who fails in his duty “to promote holiness in the World; not by talk only” (83) so that he is exposed as a worldling of false piety—the pilgrims arrive at Vanity. We have already considered the biblical basis for that town's eagerness to persecute Christians; but the episode also contains an acid account of the activities that the world prefers. Here, God's judgment is less imminent than it seemed in the City of Destruction, though no less certain. Instead of stressing the ultimate wrath to come, the narrative now grimly satirizes the temporal follies of worldly folk, as well as their wicked conduct toward Christians.

Bunyan builds up his portrait by fitting together a tight mosaic of scriptural references; his portrait of “the world” is going to be almost literally what the Bible says it is, for it will be based on the Bible's very words. In the opening sentences his tone is wryly humorous:

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 then 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.

(88)

The marginal citations account for the name of the town and suggest many details for the rest of the portrait. Isaiah 40.17 mentions “vanity” as a term for all the countries of the world: “All nations before him are as nothing; and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity.” In the first chapter of Ecclesiastes, the speaker, surveying the whole world, finds it all “vanity” without any “profit”:

Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity. What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?

(2-3)

The word “profit” seems to have given Bunyan the idea of making a commercial fair the main feature of the town of Vanity.

One of the “nations” mentioned later by Isaiah is Babylon. This fact has influenced the description of the merchandise for sale at the Fair, which contains representative samples of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.

Therefore at this Fair are all such Merchandise sold, as Houses, Lands, Trades, Places, Honours, Preferments, Titles, Countreys, Kingdoms, Lusts, Pleasures, and Delights of all sorts, as Whores, Bauds, Wives, Husbands, Children, Masters, Servants, 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 Juglings, 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, Adultries, False-swearers, and that of a blood-red colour.

(88)

The device of mixing people and things indiscriminately shows that the merchants of the Fair, though preoccupied with wealth, are unable to distinguish true value. Bunyan's theme and technique, along with many of the particular items on sale, are derived from an uncited passage describing God's judgment on the worldly merchants of Babylon, in Revelation 18:

Alas, alas, that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.

And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her; for no man buyeth their merchandise any more:

The merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stones, and of pearls, and fine linen, and purple, and silk, and scarlet, and all thyine wood, and all manner vessels of ivory, and all manner vessels of most precious wood, and of brass, and iron, and marble,

And cinnamon, and odours, and ointments, and frankincense, and wine, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and beasts, and sheep, and horses, and chariots, and slaves, and souls of men.

(10-13)

Much of the context of this passage is reproduced in Bunyan's story, even if the reader does not recognize the ultimate biblical source. The early Christian churches in Revelation both scorned and feared their worldly persecutors. Similarly, the pilgrims refuse to trade with the Fair and are fiercely punished by its rulers. In Revelation, God's wrath has visited Babylon, and the prospect of a repetition of this event remains in the background of the new narrative.

Still taking his cue from Isaiah's identification of “all nations” with “vanity,” Bunyan assigns them all to particular streets in the Fair. A parenthetical note makes certain that his meaning is clear:

And as in other Fairs of less moment, there are 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. Countreys, 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.

(88-89)

The biblical citations now begin to relate this portrait to earlier satiric passages in the narrative, since “the world” is now mentioned directly: “Now, as I said, the way to the Coelestial City lyes just thorow this Town, where this lusty Fair is kept; and he that will go to the City, and yet not go thorow this Town, must needs go out of the World.” These words are an adroit combination of the idea of the journey of life with Paul's admission that some contact with other “lusty” sinners is unavoidable:

I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators:

Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolators; for then must ye needs go out of the world.

(1 Corinthians 5.9-10)

In the final paragraph of his general description of Vanity, Bunyan makes one of the temptations of Christ a part of the town's history, taking advantage of the statement in the New Testament that the devil “shewed unto him all the kingdoms of the world” (Luke 4.5):

The Prince of Princes himself, when here, went through this Town to his own Countrey, 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 be but have done him Reverence as he went thorow the Town. Yea, because he was such a person of Honour, Beelzebub had him from Street to Street, and shewed him all the Kingdoms of the World in a little time, that he might, if possible alure that Blessed One, to cheapen and buy some of his Vanities. But he had no mind to the Merchandize, and therefore left the Town; without laying out so much as one Farthing upon these Vanities.

(89)

Satire by diminution of stature is finely handled in this portrait of the great devil Beelzebub as a kind of petty merchant, hawking his worthless, worldly wares.

The beginning of the Vanity Fair episode satirizes the world's principal lusts—particularly its desire for riches—while the latter portion attacks its habit of persecuting Christians. Bunyan unites these two themes in the verdict of the last of the jurors, Mr. Implacable: “Might I have all the World given me, I could not be reconciled to him, therefore let us forthwith bring him in guilty of death” (97). His words are an ironic perversion of Christ's warning about the last judgment: “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” (Mark 8.36). Mr. Implacable could never be reconciled to a true pilgrim even if his “profit” could include the whole world (a possession that, in biblical terms, is not worth having); and there is an evident implication that he is fated to lose his own soul at the last judgment.

After this full-scale indictment of the present world, The Pilgrim's Progress returns to more specialized satiric portraits. Having shown one character being “faithful unto death” in the practice of the Christian religion,¹¹ Bunyan now presents a group that prefers another opinion on the matter. First to make his appearance is By-ends, who is walking in the Way as a pilgrim but is cautious about giving his name to Christian and Hopeful. This trait is the first indication of his devious religious practices, which are comically displayed when he describes his relatives in the town of Fair-speech:

Chr. Pray who are your Kindred there, if a man may be so bold;

By-ends. Almost the whole Town; and in particular my Lord Turn-about, my Lord Time-sever, my Lord Fair-speech, (from whose Ancestors that Town first took its name:) Also Mr. Smooth-man, Mr. Facing-bothways, Mr. Any-thing, and the Parson of our Parish, Mr. Two-tongues, was my Mothers own Brother by Father's side: And to tell you the Truth, I am become a Gentleman of good Quality; yet my Great Grand-father was but a Water-man, looking one way, and Rowing another: and I got most of my estate by the same occupation.

(99)¹²

His emphasis on Lords and Gentlemen suggests that social status is an important motive in the religion of his clan. Rank is, of course, part of the “pride of life” that Faithful rejected before his martyrdom.

Christian denounces By-ends' preference for a comfortable religion. Instead, By-ends is joined by three others who find his company congenial—Mr. Hold-the-World, Mr. Money-love, and Mr. Save-all. For the first time in his story, Bunyan sends all the godly characters offstage and satirizes representatives of the world by having them converse with one another. Like Adam the first, Shame, and Mr. Implacable, they prove to be adapt at self-condemnation. Mr. Hold-the-World, for example, is obviously a good companion for his two miserly friends, since he finds that both nature and the Bible demonstrate the validity of the “profit” motive:

Let us be wise as Serpents, 'tis best to make hay when the Sun shines; you see how the Bee lieth still all winter and bestirs her then only when she can have profit with pleasure. God sends sometimes Rain, and sometimes Sunshine; if they be such fools to go through the first, yet let us be content to take fair weather along with us. For my part I like that Religion best, that will stand with the security of Gods good blessings unto us; for who can imagin that is ruled by his reason, since God has bestowed upon us the good things of this life, but that he would have us keep them for his sake. Abraham and Solomon grew rich in Religion. And Job saies, that a good man shall lay up gold as dust.

(102)¹³

The name of Mr. Hold-the-World sums up the commitments of all the worldly characters who have appeared thus far; all have desired to hold onto the lusts of their transitory earthly existence instead of becoming true pilgrims like Christian, who seeks the reward of eternal life. After Mr. Hold-the-World has argued that ministers and tradesmen may use religion to help their profits, the four decide to consult Christian on the subject. The answer they receive hits directly at the philosophy embodied in Mr. Hold-the-World: “Even a babe in Religion may answer ten thousand such questions. For if it be unlawful to follow Christ for loaves, as it is, Joh. 6. How much more abominable is it to make of him and religion a stalking-horse to get and enjoy the world” (105). Christian then stuns the four worldly representatives into silence with a barrage of scriptural citations.

By-ends and his fellows come to grief when they reach Demas's silver mine, in the following episode. The name of the proprietor is taken from a pertinent remark in one of Paul's epistles: “Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world” (2 Timothy 4.10). As his silver mine indicates, Demas's motivation is interpreted in Bunyan's story as the love of riches. He is denounced by Christian, who traces his biblical ancestry to Judas (the betrayer of Christ for thirty pieces of silver) and Gehazi (who in the Old Testament attempted to get silver by fraud and was stricken with leprosy). Since By-ends, Hold-the-World, and the others tried to combine religion and the pursuit of wealth, they end their pilgrimage appropriately by falling into the mine. Christian's song links their fate to the point of the previous satiric portraits:

By-ends, and Silver-Demas, both agree;
One calls, the other runs, that he may be
A sharer in his Lucre: so these two
Take up in this World, and no further go.

(108)

The scenes considered thus far show Bunyan directing his Bible-based satire with telling consistency. Nearly all the world's vices are summed up in the three daughters of Adam the first: the sins of the flesh, the love of riches, and the desire for rank and ease. The world, in turn, regards Christians as foolish, dangerous, or mad.

MR. IGNORANCE

In the episodes involving Mr. Ignorance, something is missing from the sure touch that Bunyan has exhibited elsewhere in the First Part. The problem is not that he has failed to create an interesting character, for the portrait of Ignorance—a kind of early Candide—is vivid and memorable; as an exercise in satire, though, it almost certainly misses its mark.

The first interview with Ignorance occurs shortly before the encounter with Atheist. Like the latter, he is under suspicion as soon as he appears. Bearing an unflattering name, he walks into the Way from the country of Conceit and is described as “a very brisk Lad” (123). Some of his first words indicate that he will condemn himself by speaking scriptural quotations, as did Adam the first when he told the names of his daughters to Faithful. Listing his qualifications for entering the Celestial City, he gives this description of himself: “I know my Lords will, and I have been a good Liver, I pay every man his own; I Pray, Fast, pay Tithes, and give Alms, and have left my Countrey, for whither I am going” (123-24). His remark recalls the parable of the Pharisee in the temple, whose posturing contrasted with the publican's humility:

The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican.

I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.

And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.

(Luke 18.11-13)

The Pharisees are a promising source of allusions for Bunyan's satire on worldly folk, but he does not develop the reference in this scene. Instead, Christian ends the first meeting by quoting texts from Proverbs and Ecclesiastes: “When Christian saw that the man was wise in his own conceit; he said to Hopeful, whisperingly. There is more hopes of a fool then of him. And said moreover, When he that is a fool walketh by the way, his wisdom faileth him, and he saith to every one that he is a fool” (Proverbs 26.12; Ecclesiastes 10.3). Unlike the great majority of such citations in The Pilgrim's Progress, these do not seem wholly applicable to the character who illustrates them. Ignorance has shown that he possesses courtesy and modesty—qualities not usually associated with conceited fools. When Christian calls him a potential “Thief and a Robber” for not coming in at the Gate, he responds, “Gentlemen, ye be utter strangers to me, I know you not, be content to follow the Religion of your Countrey, and I will follow the Religion of mine. I hope all will be well.” He has at least demonstrated an understanding of another text from Proverbs: “A soft answer turneth away wrath.”

After several adventures, Christian and Hopeful hold another debate with Ignorance. Their talk ranges over a number of theological issues, and on every point Ignorance takes a stand that has been condemned in previous discussions throughout the First Part. Yet, although the weight of the argument is wholly against him, Ignorance does not cut a poor figure in the interview. He continues to answer his overbearing companions respectfully, asking enough questions to obtain a full awareness of their opinions. Then, unlike most of their previous opponents, he shows real skill in debate. Against Christian's views on justification, he raises the issue of antinomianism and receives only invective in reply:

IGNOR.
What! would you have us trust to what Christ in his own person has done without us? This conceit would loosen the reines of our lust, and tollerate us to live as we list: For what matter how we live if we may be Justified by Christs personal righteousness from all, when we believe it?
CHR.
Ignorance is thy name, and as thy name is, so art thou; even this thy answer demonstrateth what I say. Ignorant thou art of what Justifying righteousness is, and, as Ignorant how to secure thy Soul through the faith of it from the heavy wrath of God.

(148)

Eventually, Ignorance also decides that Christian and Hopeful must be mad. But, in contrast to previous representatives of the world, he reaches this conclusion after a lengthy inquiry, and he maintains an attitude of moderation in the face of their increasing petulance:

HOPE.
Ask him if ever he had Christ revealed to him from Heaven?
IGNOR.
What! you are a man for revelations! I believe that what both you, and all the rest of you say about that matter, is but the fruit of distracted braines.
HOPE.
Why man! Christ is so hid in God from the natural apprehensions of all flesh, that he cannot by any man be savingly known, unless God the Father reveals him to them.
IGNOR.
That is your faith, but not mine; yet mine I doubt not, is as good as yours: though I have not in my head so many whimzies as you.

(148-49)

Though Christian is ready with texts about the necessity of revelation for knowledge of God, the biblical application of Bunyan's scene has been severely weakened. The sinful representative of the world is persistently turning the other cheek, while the godly pilgrims have become sourly self-righteous. Bunyan has in fact reversed the roles of the participants in the parable to which he alluded in the earlier scene. Having acquired the publican's humility, his Pharisee makes the pilgrims beat their breasts to assert their own superiority.

In the final appearance of Ignorance, at the very end of the First Part, Bunyan returns briefly to the technique with which he began the first encounter. After crossing the River of Death, Ignorance approaches the Celestial City: “But he was asked by the men that lookt over the top of the Gate, Whence came you? and what would you have? He answered, I have eat and drank in the presence of the King, and he has taught in our Streets” (162-63). His words are taken from an earlier parable in Luke that also attacks the Pharisees (13.25-27). The King of the Celestial City orders Ignorance carried off to hell—a response that is similar to that of the master of the house in the parable: “depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.” More of these allusions might have salvaged a victory for Bunyan's attack on Ignorance, but his last appearance is too brief to erase the impression made in the two previous episodes.

Alone among Bunyan's worldly portraits, this one does little to further his satiric aims. Ignorance does not exhibit the right reactions, since he hears Christian and Hopeful out with patience instead of making fun of them. Furthermore, he shows little interest in any of the daughters of Adam the first, so the biblical texts that they represent do not appear to apply to him. Ignorance indeed fails to enter the Way through the Wicket Gate, and he hires the services of “Vain-Hope, a Ferry-man” to negotiate the River of Death. At these points the Bible is against him, for Bunyan's Wicket Gate is the “strait gate” of Matthew 7.13-14, and the children of Israel did not float across the Red Sea or the Jordan; yet at other moments, as we have seen, he seems to have Scripture on his side. Not surprisingly, Ignorance is the only false pilgrim who has won the sympathy of numerous readers.¹⁴ We should not, however, allow the comparative failure of this one attempt to obscure our appreciation for Bunyan's overall achievement as a satirist in the First Part of The Pilgrim's Progress. Most of the way, his book is working in smooth partnership with the Book, holding worldly folk up to ridicule by making them behave exactly as the Bible says they do.

BIBLICAL SATIRE IN THE SECOND PART

Two episodes in Bunyan's sequel continue to develop the satiric themes of the First Part. Before Christiana leaves for the Celestial City, she is visited by Mrs. Timorous, who repeats some of Mr. Worldly-Wiseman's warnings about the dangers of becoming a pilgrim. When Christiana rebuffs her, Mrs. Timorous goes to seek comfort with her worldly friends, “Mrs. Bats-eyes, Mrs. Inconsiderate, Mrs. Light-mind, and Mrs. Know-nothing” (184).¹⁵ Bunyan handles the scene in the same manner as he did the one involving By-ends and his friends (100-05). With no godly characters present, these townspeople condemn themselves out of their own mouths in a dialogue that is summed up in the remark of Mrs. Inconsiderate: “'twas never a good World since these whimsical Fools dwelt in it” (185). Mrs. Light-mind adds a coda that extends Bunyan's satire on the lusts of the flesh by inventing several new characters:

Come put this kind of Talk away. I was Yesterday at Madam Wantons, where we were as merry as the Maids. For who do you think should be there, but I, and Mrs. Love-the-flesh, and three or four more, with Mr. Lechery, Mrs. Filth, and some others. So there we had Musick and dancing, and what else was meet to fill up the pleasure. And I dare say my Lady her self is an admirably well-bred Gentlewoman, and Mr. Lechery is as pretty a Fellow.

The portrait of Madam Bubble, included near the end of the Second Part (300-03), also develops satiric material from the earlier narrative. Like the merchants at Vanity Fair, Madam Bubble ministers to the world's interests and pleasures: “I am the Mistriss of the world.”¹⁶ She is presented as a temptation of Mr. Stand-fast, who says he met her as “one in very pleasant Attire, but old, that presented her self unto me, and offered me three things, to wit, her Body, her Purse, and her Bed.” Her proposal is the same as the one made by Adam the first when he offered to Faithful the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Bunyan intends the bed to suggest worldly ease, rather than lust—as Mr. Stand-fast makes clear: “I was both a weary, and sleepy, I am also as poor as a Howlet, and that, perhaps, the Witch knew.”

Madam Bubble possesses the traits of many worldly figures who have appeared in both parts of The Pilgrim's Progress. Since she wears “a great Purse by her side,” with “her Hand often in it fingering her Mony, as if that was her Hearts delight,” she is evidently kin to the citizens of Vanity Fair, and to Mr. Money-love and Demas. Madam Bubble's sociability is similar to that of Mrs. Timorous and her friends: “She is a great Gossiper, she is always, both she and her Daughters, at one Pilgrim's Heels or other, now Commending, and then preferring the excellencies of this Life.” She also shares the attitudes of Shame: “She always laugheth Poor Pilgrims to scorn, but highly commends the Rich.” The biblical citations for this portrait include 1 John 2.15, the verse (already quoted) just before the one that contains the names of the daughters of Adam the first.

The scenes involving Mrs. Timorous and Madam Bubble appear somewhat out of place in the Second Part, largely because the typical actions of Bunyan's characters no longer conform to the ideas that are affirmed by the satire of the earlier story. At the beginning of the Second Part, we learn that the world in general has changed its mind about Christian: “For though when he was here, he was Fool in every mans mouth, yet now he is gone, he is highly commended of all. For 'tis said he lives bravely where he is: Yea, many of them that are resolved never to run his hazzards, yet have their mouths water at his gains” (175). When they reach the town of Vanity, the second group of pilgrims remembers the sufferings of their predecessors. Mr. Contrite informs them that religion is now esteemed in certain neighborhoods: “In those days we were afraid to walk the Streets, but now we can shew our Heads. Then the Name of a Professor was odious, now, specially in some parts of our Town (for you know our Town is large) Religion is counted Honourable” (275).

For their part, the pilgrims exhibit a greater affection for the world. Although in his preface Bunyan says that his new party will show “how they still / Refuse this World, to do their Fathers will” (167), the leisurely pace of the second journey makes their refusal seem less wholehearted. Instead of passing a night at the House Beautiful, as did Christian, they stay “about a Month or above” (224). They spend over ten days at the house of Gaius, and “a great while” at Mr. Mnason's in the town of Vanity (269; 277). The names of these hosts recall those of early Christians who provided lodging for Paul (Romans 16.23; Acts 21.16). They remind us that, even in New Testament times, Christians were able to find a measure of comfort and hospitality in the world.¹⁷

In the friendlier atmosphere of the Second Part, there is much less emphasis on the dreadful prospect of God's wrath. Instead, Bunyan invents new characters in order to stress a completely different side of the divine nature—God's mercy and love. His method continues to imitate the sermon exemplum, since he regularly presents an individual and then turns to the scriptures that describe him. He still has a satirist's attitude toward his characters, for their behavior also appears ridiculous when it is compared to the ideas that are affirmed by the narrative. However, the result is satire of a much milder sort. In the author's eyes, the sins of this new group are far less vicious than those which he assailed in the portraits of the First Part.

The new theme for Bunyan's satire is announced in the opening dialogue of the Second Part, where the topic of conversation is not the day of judgment but the warm reception given Christian at the Celestial City. A young woman named Mercy is an important member of the second group of pilgrims, and the pattern for the satiric portraits of the Second Part is presented in the scene when this new character is fearful of being rejected at the Wicket Gate. After knocking loudly, she falls down in a faint; the Keeper—gradually identified as Christ himself—then goes out and brings her in. Christiana, who was already inside, tells Mercy that “When he heard your lumbring noise, he gave a wonderful Innocent smile. I believe what you did pleas'd him well enough, for he shewed no sign to the contrary” (192). The Keeper's smile indicates that there is something faintly comic about Mercy's anxiety over her acceptance. In this part of The Pilgrim's Progress, a more merciful God is hardly likely to reject anyone who bears such a name.

Mercy's needless anxiety is shared by several other characters who appear later. The first of these is Mr. Fearing, who also fainted at the Wicket Gate (250). Great-heart emphasizes that his anxieties were not about the dangers of the present world: “When we came to the Hill Difficulty, he made no stick at that, nor did he much fear the Lyons. For you must know that his Trouble was not about such things as those, his Fear was about his Acceptance at last” (251). The citations at the end of the portrait make plain that Mr. Fearing's condition was not unusual in biblical times. Psalm 88 is particularly applicable: “For my soul is full of troubles: and my life draweth nigh unto the grave. … I am afflicted and ready to die from my youth up: while I suffer thy terrors I am distracted” (3.15).

During their stay with Gaius, the Pilgrims rescue Mr. Feeble-mind, a friend of Fearing's who “would, if I could, tho I can but craul, spend my Life in the Pilgrims way” (267). Because of his many infirmities, he objects to joining the group—until he is finally comforted with a quotation from one of Paul's epistles: “But Brother, said Mr. Great-heart. I have it in Commission, to comfort the feeble minded, and to support the weak” (270; 1 Thessalonians 5.14). He is soon joined by a man on crutches, Mr. Ready-to-halt, whose name is explained by a citation from Psalm 38: “For I am ready to halt, and my sorrow is continually before me” (17).

Part of the quiet comedy of the dancing scene near Doubting Castle is at the expense of the participants. These “chicken-hearted” pilgrims can only attain a degree of Christian joy after they have actually looked on the severed head of Giant Depair:

Now when Feeble-mind, and Ready-to-halt saw that it was the Head of Gyant-Dispair indeed, they were very jocond and merry. Now Christiana, if need was, could play upon the Vial, and her Daughter Mercie upon the Lute: So, since they were so merry disposed, she plaid them a Lesson, and Ready-to-halt would Dance. So he took Dispondencie's Daughter, named Much-afraid, by the Hand, and to dancing they went in the Road. True, he could not Dance without one Crutch in his Hand, but I promise you, he footed it well; also the Girl was to be commended, for she answered the Musick handsomely.

(283)

Biblical inspiration for this episode probably comes from a passage in Jeremiah that looks forward to a joyful reunion of the scattered children of Israel: “Then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance, both young men and old men together: for I will turn their mourning into joy, and will comfort them, and make them rejoice from their sorrow” (31.13). We feel that these timid Christians might have embraced the joys and comforts of their religion a little earlier.

In the portraits of both parts of The Pilgrim's Progress, Bunyan's satiric methods are never far removed from their origins in the art of the sermon. Like a good homilist, he produces exempla in which character and action convey the spirit and often the exact language of particular biblical texts. Apart from this point-by-point correspondence between his narrative and Scripture, there is also a larger, more general resemblance between the satire in the two parts of his book and the conceptions that dominate the two principal portions of the Christian Bible. In each part, Bunyan's portraits stress the same attributes of the Deity that are emphasized in each of the two testaments. Thus, although many passages in the Old Testament testify to God's mercy, the dominant impression is that of a stern and angry Jehovah, who punishes wickedness by sending fires and floods, and who will judge Israel and all other nations. This is the God whose wrath occasions Christian's flight from the world and causes him to try to persuade its sinful inhabitants to join him. Similarly, while the idea of judgment is reaffirmed from Matthew through Revelation, the most important doctrine in the New Testament is the affirmation that a merciful God has sent his son to redeem the world. Much of Bunyan's satire in the Second Part of The Pilgrim's Progress suggests that this redemption can extend even to the most faint-hearted of believers.

Consideration of Bunyan-as-satirist has the effect of altering to some degree his place in literary history and even our impression of his personality. We tend to think of him as a holdover from the earlier seventeenth century, having little in common with the more secular writers who fill our anthologies of Restoration literature. At least one of the latter group agreed with this verdict. During act III, scene 4 of The Way of the World, Lady Wishfort sends Mrs. Marwood offstage to overhear an intrigue: “There are books over the chimney—Quarles and Prynne, and the Short View of the Stage, with Bunyan's works to entertain you.” The suggestion is that, along with the other dour moralists on her closet shelf, the author of The Pilgrim's Progress would have been horrified by the lusts of Lady Wishfort's friends.

Nevertheless, Bunyan's methods do have something in common with those of more celebrated satirists of the Restoration period, and perhaps Congreve's image of him—like our own—lays too much stress on the stern and sober Puritan. Unlike the anxious younger man who wrote Grace Abounding, the later Bunyan had a self-assurance that enabled him to make merry with his opponents and to encourage his less confident friends. What is really unusual about his satire is that its premises are so firmly on the Lord's side rather than on the devil's. Skeptics have produced countless travesties, lampoons, and other assaults on the ridiculous behavior of dedicated Christians. It is rare indeed, though, to find a believer using the Bible to roast the complacent foes of Christianity or to laugh away the fears of the faint-hearted faithful. We would do well to remember the painting that hangs in London's National Portrait Gallery: while John Bunyan is shown holding the Bible firmly, there is a half-smile on his face.

Notes

1. Brean S. Hammond, “The Pilgrim's Progress: Satire and Social Comment,” in The Pilgrim's Progress: Critical and Historical Views, ed. Vincent Newey (Totowa, N.J.: Barnes & Noble, 1980) 124.

2. A. Richard Dutton, “‘Interesting but tough’: Reading The Pilgrim's Progress,” Studies in English Literature 18 (1978): 447; Elizabeth Adeney, “Bunyan: A Unified Vision?” Critical Review 17 (1974): 103. Adeney focuses on comic rather than satiric aspects of The Pilgrim's Progress. Henri Talon's John Bunyan: The Man and his Works, trans. Barbara Wall (London: Rockliff, 1951) is sensitive to Bunyan's humor but does not discuss it in detail; see 205, 207-08, 219, 319. Except in connection with the essays of Hammond and Adeney, satire and comedy are seldom mentioned in the recent annotated bibliography by James F. Forrest and Richard Lee Greaves, John Bunyan: A Reference Guide (Boston: G. K. Hall, 1982), and Greaves does not allude to this side of Bunyan in his retrospective article, “Bunyan Through the Centuries: Some Reflections,” English Studies 64 (1983): 113-21.

3. For a discussion of how Bunyan's mind worked with biblical texts, see my article, “Bunyan's Special Talent: Biblical Texts as ‘Events’ in Grace Abounding and The Pilgrim's Progress,” English Literary Renaissance 11 (1981): 329-43.

4. John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress, ed. James Blanton Wharey, 2nd ed. rev. Roger Sharrock (Oxford: Clarendon, 1960) 10. Subsequent references are to this text.

5. Obstinate's words recall Proverbs 26.16: “The sluggard is wiser in his own conceit than seven men that can render a reason.” However, the real sluggard is Obstinate himself, who—rather than going on pilgrimage—is choosing to remain in the City of Destruction.

6. Bunyan's margin on p. 13 cites Titus 1.2 as an ultimate guarantee that the biblical citations in his story possess a truth older than that of any worldly authorities. In that verse Paul greets Titus “In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began.”

7. All statements in this paper about biblical sources and the frequency with which certain words occur in the Bible are based on Robert Young's Analytical Concordance to the Bible, 22nd Am. ed. (New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1955). This is a concordance to the King James or Authorized Version, which Bunyan almost always prefers. A modern work like Young's shows how often Bunyan reproduces the precise language of particular biblical passages.

8. The pilgrim's wary attitude toward Atheist reflects Bunyan's own experience with the problems of unbelief. See Grace Abounding, ed. Roger Sharrock (Oxford: Clarendon, 1962) 31, 102.

9. The importance of the eleventh and twelfth chapters of Hebrews in the creation of The Pilgrim's Progress is discussed in my article, “Bunyan and the Epistle to the Hebrews: His Source for the Idea of Pilgrimage in The Pilgrim's Progress,” Studies in Philology 79 (1982): 279-96.

10. Since Bunyan was so reticent about his extra-biblical reading, it is difficult to judge just how much his treatment of the world's three lusts owes to Christian tradition. From the early Fathers on, commentators attempted to interpret and harmonize the 1 John passage with Adam and Eve's temptations—which were often seen as threefold (Genesis 3)—and with the three temptations of Jesus (Matthew 4 and Luke 4; see Donald R. Howard, The Three Temptations: Medieval Man in Search of the World [Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press, 1966] 42-75). Bunyan may well have been in touch with pre-Reformation Christianity orally, through the conservative preaching that he heard in Bedfordshire (G. R. Owst, Literature and Pulpit in Medieval England [Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1933] 97-109). By having Adam the first offer Faithful his three daughters (“The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life”), Bunyan associates the world's three lusts with the heritage of sin from Adam's fall (69). However, he does not make a point-by-point comparison to the Genesis 3 account or to the three temptations of Jesus—although, as noted below, in the Vanity Fair episode he does dramatize the devil's offer of the kingdoms of the world (89). In the scene leading up to Christian's entrance at the Wicket Gate, Bunyan comes close to invoking another traditional tripartite formula—the world, the flesh, and the devil; Christian reflects that the arguments of Mr. Worldly-Wiseman flow “only from the flesh,” and Good-Will pulls him in through the gate to escape the arrows of Beelzebub (24-25). But devils appear only briefly in The Pilgrim's Progress, while the flesh is usually presented among the other attractions of the world.

11. The pun on Faithful's name is used by Evangelist in anticipation of the event (87).

12. The names of By-ends' kindred suggest at least two pertinent biblical references. The phrase “smooth man” occurs in the King James Version only in the description of Jacob, who is cheating Esau out of his birthright (Genesis 27.11). By-ends' parson, Mr. Two-tongues, recalls Paul's warning about the conduct of clergy in the early church: “Likewise must the deacons be grave, not doubletongued, not given to much wine, not greedy of filthy lucre” (1 Timothy 3.8).

13. Mr. Hold-the-World's words contain a heavy irony of which he is presumably unconscious. His opening phrase is taken from the instructions of Jesus to his disciples:

    Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves. But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourage you in their synagogues; and ye shall be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony against them and the Gentiles.

    (Matthew 10.16-18)

    Mr. Hold-the-World is not likely to meet this sort of fate, but the description perfectly sums up the recent martyrdom of Faithful.

14. Ignorance has received particular praise from readers who have not appreciated Bunyan's book as a whole. Roger Sharrock mentions that “James Foster, an enlightened eighteenth-century Dissenting Preacher, used to say that none of the characters in The Pilgrim's Progress spoke sense except Ignorance.” Sharrock, John Bunyan (London: Hutchinsons, 1954) 92-93. When Alfred Noyes wrote an attack on The Pilgrim's Progress at the time of the tricentennial anniversary of Bunyan's birth, he also defended this character: “Study the fate of poor Mr. Ignorance who, both in his conversation with these vain and boastful pilgrims, Christian and Hopeful, and in his unassuming approach (without trumpets) to the Celestial City, strikes one as a far better Christian and a far more honest man.” Noyes, “Bunyan—a Revolution,” The Bookman (London) 75 (October 1928): 14. As Roland Mushat Frye has suggested, Ignorance may indeed be intended as a portrait of the Christian moralist who “refuses to acknowledge that he is himself not good, but a sinner.” Frye, God, Man, and Satan: Patterns of Christian Thought and Life in Paradise Lost, Pilgrim's Progress, and the Great Theologians (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1960) 117. If so, Bunyan has failed to marshal his biblical texts in ways that have convincingly chastised many other would-be pilgrims. For some observers, the lash of his satire has recoiled upon him.

15. The names of these four characters—Bats-eyes, Inconsiderate, Light-mind, and Know-nothing—seem to be an ironic recollection of a verse in Isaiah. The prophet is looking forward to a time when all of Israel will understand God's actions: “That they may see, and know, and consider, and understand together, that the hand of the Lord hath done this, and the Holy One of Israel hath created it” (41.20). Bunyan's scene plainly implies that the time has not yet arrived.

16. “Bubble” is not a biblical word, but Roger Sharrock notes that in Quarles's Emblemes it is a frequent image for the world's vanity (351).

17. For a definitive study of Bunyan's later views about the separatist church, as they are incorporated in the Second Part of The Pilgrim's Progress, see John R. Knott, Jr., “Bunyan and the Holy Community,” Studies in Philology 80 (1983): 200-25.