in any way
connected with spiritual religion that does not come out even in the
obstinate man's family life.

John Bunyan's Obstinate, both by his conduct as well as by the etymology
of his name, not only stands in the way of his own salvation, but he does
all he can to stand in the way of other men setting out to salvation
also. Obstinate set out after Christian to fetch him back by force, and
if it had not been that he met his match in Christian, _The Pilgrim's
Progress_ would never have been written. 'That can by no means be,' said
Christian to his pursuer, and he is first called Christian when he shows
that one man can be as obstinate in good as another man can be in evil.
'I never now can go back to my former life.' And then the two obstinate
men parted company for ever, Christian in holy obstinacy being determined
to have eternal life at any cost, and Obstinate as determined against it.
The opening pages of _The Pilgrim's Progress_ set the two men very
graphically and very impressively before us.

As to the cure of obstinacy, the rod in a firm, watchful, wise, and
loving hand will cure it. And in later life a long enough and close
enough succession of humble, yielding, docile, submissive,
self-chastening and thanksgiving acts will cure it. Reading and obeying
the best books on the subjugation and the regulation of the heart will
cure it. Descending with Dante to where the obstinate, and the
embittered, and the gloomy, and the sullen have made their beds in hell
will cure it. And much and most agonising prayer will above all cure it.

'O Lord, if thus so obstinate I,
Choose Thou, before my spirit die,
A piercing pain, a killing sin,
And to my proud heart run them in.

PLIABLE

'He hath not root in himself.'--Our Lord.

With one stroke of His pencil our Lord gives us this Flaxman-like outline
of one of his well-known hearers. And then John Bunyan takes up that so
expressive profile, and puts flesh and blood into it, till it becomes the
well-known Pliable of _The Pilgrim's Progress_. We call the text a
parable, but our Lord's parables are all portraits--portraits and groups
of portraits, rather than ordinary parables. Our Lord knew this man
quite well who had no root in himself. Our Lord had crowds of such men
always running after Him, and He threw off this rapid portrait from
hundreds of men and women who caused discredit to fall on His name and
His work, and burdened His h