e for one another that spring
out of God and out of His love alone.

"The tree
Sucks kindlier nurture from a soil enriched
By its own fallen leaves; and man is made,
In heart and spirit, from deciduous hopes
And things that seem to perish."

MR. SKILL

"The vine of Sodom."--_Moses_.

With infinite delicacy John Bunyan here tells us the sad story of
Matthew's sore sickness at the House Beautiful. The cause of the sore
sickness, its symptoms, its serious nature, and its complete cures are
all told with the utmost plainness; but, at the same time, with the most
exquisite delicacy. Bunyan calls the ancient physician who is summoned
in and who effects the cure, Mr. Skill, but you must believe that Bunyan
himself is Mr. Skill; and I question if this skilful writer ever wrote a
more skilful page than just this page that now lies open before him who
has the eyes to read it.

Matthew, it must always be remembered, was by this time a young man. He
was the eldest son of Christiana his mother, and for some time now she
had been a sorely burdened widow. Matthew's father was no longer near
his son to watch over him and to warn him against the temptations and the
dangers that wait on opening manhood. And thus his mother, with all her
other cares, had to be both father and mother to her eldest son; and,
with all her good sense and all her long and close acquaintance with the
world, she was too fond a mother to suspect any evil of her eldest son.
And thus it was that Christiana had nearly lost her eldest son before her
eyes were open to the terrible dangers he had for a long time been
running. For it was so, that the upward way that this household without
a head had to travel lay through a land full of all kinds of dangers both
to the bodies and to the souls of such travellers as they were. And what
well-nigh proved a fatal danger to Matthew lay right in his way. It was
Beelzebub's orchard. Not that this young man's way lay through that
orchard exactly; yet, walled up as was that orchard with all its
forbidden fruit, that evil fruit would hang over the wall so that if any
lusty youth wished to taste it, he had only to reach up to the
over-hanging branches and plash down on himself some of the forbidden
bunches. Now, that was just what Matthew had done. Till we have him
lying at the House Beautiful, not only not able to enjoy the delights of
the House and of the season, but so pained in his bow