Works of John Bunyan — Complete

by John Bunyan

That which has made me publish this book is,

1. For that wickedness, like a flood, is like to drown our English world. It begins already to be above the tops of the mountains; it has almost swallowed up all; our youth, middle age, old age, and all, are almost carried away of this flood. O debauchery, debauchery, what hast thou done in England! Thou hast corrupted our young men, and hast made our old men beasts; thou hast deflowered our virgins, and hast made matrons bawds. Thou hast made our earth 'to reel to and fro like a drunkard'; it is in danger to 'be removed like a cottage,' yea, it is, because transgression is so heavy upon it, like to fall and rise no more (Isa 24:20). O! that I could mourn for England, and for the sins that are committed therein, even while I see that, without repentance, the men of God's wrath are about to deal with us, each having his 'slaughtering weapon in his hand' (Eze 9:1,2). Well, I have written, and by God's assistance shall pray that this flood may abate in England; and could I but see the tops of the mountains above it, I should think that these waters were abating.

2. It is the duty of those that can to cry out against this deadly plague, yea, to lift up their voice as with a trumpet against it, that men may be awakened about it, fly from it, as from that which is the greatest of evils. Sin pulled angels out of heaven, pulls men down to hell, and overthroweth kingdoms. Who, that sees a house on fire, will not give the alarm to them that dwell therein? Who, that sees the land invaded, will not set the beacons on a flame. Who, that sees the devils as roaring lions, continually devouring souls, will not make an out-cry? But above all, when we see sin, sinful sin, a swallowing up a nation, sinking of a nation, and bringing its inhabitants to temporal, spiritual, and eternal ruin, shall we not cry out and cry, They are drunk, but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink; they are intoxicated with the deadly poison of sin, which will, if its malignity be not by wholesome means allayed, bring soul and body, and estate, and country, and all, to ruin and destruction?

3. In and by this outcry I shall deliver myself from the ruins of them that perish; for a man can do no more in this matter—I mean a man in my capacity—than to detect and condemn the wickedness, warn the evil doer of the judgment, and fly therefrom myself. But O! that I might not only deliver myself! O that many would hear, and turn at this my cry from sin! that they may be secured from the death and judgment that attend it.

Why I have handled the matter in this method is best known to myself. And why I have concealed most of the names of the persons whose sins or punishments I here and there in this book make relation of is, (1.) For that neither the sins nor judgments were all alike open; the sins of some were committed, and the judgments executed for them, only in a corner. Not to say that I could not learn some of their names, for could I, I should not have made them public, for this reason, (2.) Because I would not provoke those of their relations that survive them; I would not justly provoke them; and yet, as I think, I should, should I have entailed their punishment to their sins, and both to their names, and so have turned them into the world. (3.) Nor would I lay them under disgrace and contempt, which would, as I think, unavoidably have happened unto them had I withal inserted their names.

As for those whose names I mention, their crimes or judgments were manifest; public almost as anything of that nature that happeneth to mortal men. Such therefore have published their own shame by their sin, and God his anger, by taking of open vengeance. As Job says, God has struck 'them as wicked men in the open sight of others' (Job 34:26). So that I cannot conceive, since their sin and judgment was so conspicuous, that my admonishing the world thereof should turn to their detriment. For the publishing of these things are, so far as relation is concerned, intended for remembrances, that they may also bethink themselves, repent and turn to God, lest the judgments for their sins should prove hereditary. For the God of heaven hath threatened to visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, if they hate him, to the third and fourth generation (Exo 20:5).

Nebuchadnezzar's punishment for his pride being open—for he was for his sin driven from his kingly dignity, and from among men too, to eat grass like an ox, and to company with the beasts—Daniel did not stick to tell Belshazzar his son to his face thereof; nor to publish it that it might be read and remembered by the generations to come. The same may be said of Judas and Ananias, &c., for their sin and punishment were known to all the dwellers at Jerusalem (Acts 1:19). Nor is it a sign but of desperate impenitence and hardness of heart, when the offspring or relations of those who have fallen by open, fearful, and prodigious judgments, for their sin, shall overlook, forget, pass by, or take no notice of such high outgoings of God against them and their house. Thus Daniel aggravates Belshazzar's crime, for that he hardened his heart in pride, though he knew that for that very sin and transgression his father was brought down from his height, and made to be a companion for asses. 'And thou his son, O Belshazzar,' says he, 'hast not humbled thine heart, though thou knewest all this' (Dan 5:22). A home reproof, indeed, but home [reproof] is most fit for an open and a continued in transgression.

Let those, then, that are the offspring or relations of such, who by their own sin, and the dreadful judgments of God, are made to become a sign (Deut 16:9-12), having been swept as dung from off the face of the earth, beware, lest when judgment knocks at their door, for their sins, as it did before at the door of their progenitors, it falls also with as heavy a stroke as on them that went before them (Num 16:38-40). Lest, I say, they in that day, instead of finding mercy, find for their high, daring, and judgment-affronting sins, judgment without mercy.

To conclude; let those that would not die Mr. Badman's death, take heed of Mr. Badman's ways; for his ways bring to his end. Wickedness will not deliver him that is given to it; though they should cloak all with a profession of religion. If it was a transgression of old for a man to wear a woman's apparel, surely it is a transgression now for a sinner to wear a Christian profession for a cloak. Wolves in sheep's clothing swarm in England this day; wolves both as to doctrine and as to practice too. Some men make a profession, I doubt, on purpose that they may twist themselves into a trade; and thence into an estate; yea, and if need be, into an estate knavishly, by the ruins of their neighbour. Let such take heed, for those that do such things have the greater damnation. Christian, make thy profession shine by a conversation according to the gospel; or else thou wilt damnify religion, bring scandal to thy brethren, and give offence to the enemies; and it would be better that a millstone was hanged about thy neck, and that thou, as so adorned, was cast into the bottom of the sea, than so to do. Christian, a profession according to the gospel is, in these days, a rare thing; seek then after it, put it on, and keep it without spot, and, as becomes thee, white, and clean, and thou shalt be a rare Christian.

The prophecy of the last times is, that professing men, for so I understand the text, shall be many of them base (2 Tim 3); but continue thou in the things that thou hast learned, not of wanton men, nor of licentious times, but of the Word and doctrine of God, that is, according to godliness; and thou shalt walk with Christ in white. Now, God Almighty gave his people grace, not to hate or malign sinners, nor yet to choose any of their ways, but to keep themselves pure from the blood of all men, by speaking and doing according to that name and those rules that they profess to know and love; for Jesus Christ's sake.