apprenticing David
Copperfield.

Bunyan himself, "the wondrous babe," as Dr. Brown enthusiastically styles
him, was christened on November 30th, 1628. He was born in a cottage,
long fallen, and hard by was a marshy place, "a veritable slough of
despond." Bunyan may have had it in mind when he wrote of the slough
where Christian had so much trouble. He was not a travelled man: all his
knowledge of people and places he found at his doors. He had some
schooling, "according to the rate of other poor men's children," and
assuredly it was enough.

The great civil war broke out, and Bunyan was a soldier; he tells us not
on which side. Dr. Brown and Mr. Lewis Morris think he was on that of
the Parliament, but his old father, the tinker, stood for the King. Mr.
Froude is rather more inclined to hold that he was among the "gay
gallants who struck for the crown." He does not seem to have been much
under fire, but he got that knowledge of the appearance of war which he
used in his siege of the City of Mansoul. One can hardly think that
Bunyan liked war--certainly not from cowardice, but from goodness of
heart.

In 1646 the army was disbanded, and Bunyan went back to Elstow village
and his tinkering, his bell-ringing, his dancing with the girls, his
playing at "cat" on a Sunday after service.

He married very young and poor. He married a pious wife, and read all
her library--"The Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven," and "The Practice of
Piety." He became very devout in the spirit of the Church of England,
and he gave up his amusements. Then he fell into the Slough of Despond,
then he went through the Valley of the Shadow, and battled with Apollyon.

People have wondered _why_ he fancied himself such a sinner? He
confesses to having been a liar and a blasphemer. If I may guess, I
fancy that this was merely the literary genius of Bunyan seeking for
expression. His lies, I would go bail, were tremendous romances, wild
fictions told for fun, never lies of cowardice or for gain. As to his
blasphemies, he had an extraordinary power of language, and that was how
he gave it play. "Fancy swearing" was his only literary safety-valve, in
those early days, when he played cat on Elstow Green.

Then he heard a voice dart from heaven into his soul, which said, "Wilt
thou leave thy sins and go to heaven, or have thy sins and go to hell?"
So he fell on repentance, and passed those awful years of mental torture,
when all nature see