Why then should we think that our innocent lives will exempt us from sufferings, or that troubles shall do us harm?
Alas, we have need of those bitter pills at which we so much wince. I see that I still have need of these trials; and if God will by these judge me, as he judges his saints, that I may not he condemned with the world, I will cry, Grace, grace, for ever.
Shall we deserve correction, and be angry because we have it? Or shall it come to save us, and shall we he offended with the hand that brings it? Our sickness is so great that our enemies take notice of it; let them know too that we take our purges patiently.
We are willing to pay for those potions that are given us for the health of our body, how sick soever they make us; and if God will have us pay too for that which is to better our souls, why should we grudge thereat? Those that bring us these medicines have little enough for their pains; for my part, I profess I would not for a great deal be bound, for their wages, to do their work. True, physicians are for the most part chargeable, and niggards are too loath to part with their money to them; but when necessity says they must either take physic or die, of two evils they desire to choose the least. Why, affliction is better than sin; and if God sends the one to cleanse us from the other, let us thank him, and be also content to pay the messenger.
BUNYAN'S TRIAL AND IMPRISONMENT. FROM BUNYAN'S EXAMINATION BEFORE JUSTICES KEELING, CHESTER, [Footnote: On the restoration of the house of Stuart, Charles II. entered London, in May, 1600. In November of that year, Bunyan was indicted for an upholder of unlawful assemblies and conventicles, and for not conforming to the church of England. "He was sentenced,">[ ETC.
KEELING. Justice Keeling said that I ought not to preach, and asked me where I had my authority; with many other such like words.
BUNYAN. I said that I would prove that it was lawful for me, and such as I am, to preach the word of God.
KEELING. He said unto me, By what scripture?
BUNYAN. I said, by that in the first epistle of Peter, fourth chapter and eleventh verse, and Acts eighteenth, with other scriptures; which he would not suffer me to mention, but said, Hold, not so many: which is the first?
BUNYAN. I said, This: "As every man hath received the gift, even so let him minister the same unto another, as good stewards of the grace of God. If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God."