[140] Mr. James, who, in 1815, published the "Pilgrim" in verse, conjectures that Bunyan's description of the Fair arose from his having been at Sturbridge Fair, near Cambridge. It was thus described in 1786-"The shops or booths are built in rows like streets, having each its name; as Garlick Row, Bookseller's Row, Cook Row, &c. Here are all sorts of traders, who sell by wholesale or retail; as goldsmith's toymen, braziers, turners, milliners, haberdashers, hatters, mercers, drapers, pewterers, china warehouses, and in a word, most trades that can be found in London. Here are also taverns, coffee-houses, and eating-houses, in great plenty. The chief diversions are puppets, rope-dancing, and music booths. To this Fair, people from Bedfordshire and the adjoining counties still resort. Similar kinds of fairs are now kept at Frankfort and Leipzig. These mercantile fairs were very injurious to morals; but not to the extent of debauchery and villany, which reign in our present annual fairs, near the metropolis and large cities." See an account of this fair in Hone's Year Book, page 1538-(ED). Our author evidently designed to exhibit in his allegory the grand outlines of the difficulties, temptations, and sufferings, to which believers are exposed in this evil world; which, in a work of this nature, must be related as if they came upon them one after another in regular succession; though in actual experience several may meet together, many may molest the same person again and again, and some harass him in every stage of his journey. We should, therefore, singly consider the instruction conveyed by every allegorical incident, without measuring our experience, or calculating our progress, by comparing them with circumstances which might be reversed or altered with almost endless variety. In general, Vanity Fair represents the wretched state of things in those populous places especially, where true religion is neglected and persecuted; and, indeed, "in the whole world lying in wickedness," as distinguished from the church of "redeemed sinners"-(Scott).
[141] Christ will not allow his followers to bury their talent in the earth, or to put their light under a bushel; they are not to go out of the world, or to retire into cloisters, monasteries, or deserts; but they MUST all go through this fair. Thus our Lord endured all the temptations and sufferings of this evil world, without being impeded or entangled by them, or stepping in the least aside to avoid them; and he was exposed to greater enmity and contempt than any of His followers-(Scott).
[142] The world will seek to keep you out of Heaven with mocks, flouts, taunts, threatenings, jails, gibbets, halters, burnings, and deaths. There ever was enmity between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman, and no endeavours can reconcile them. The world says, They will never come over to us; and we again say, By God's grace we will not go over to them.
[143] Holy Hunt of Hitchin, as he was called, a friend of Bunyan's, passing the market-place where mountebanks were performing, one cried after him, "Look there, Mr. Hunt!" Turning his head another way, he replied, "Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity"-(Ivimey).
[144] An odd reply. What do they mean? That they are neither afraid nor ashamed to own what was the one subject of their souls' pursuit-the truth. Understand hereby, that the whole world, which lieth in wickedness, is deceived by a lie, and is under the delusion of the father of lies. In opposition to this, all believers in Christ are said to be of the truth (1 John 3:19). They know and believe that capital truth with which God spake from Heaven, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased" (Matt. 3:17). This truth-that Jesus is the Son of God, and our only Saviour-lies at the foundation of all their hope; and to get more and more acquainted with Him, is the grand object of their pursuits. For this the world hates them; and Satan, who is an enemy to this truth, stirs up the world against them. "For," says our Lord, "they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world" (John 17:16)-(Mason).
[145] In 1670, the town porters of Bedford being commanded to assist in a brutal attack upon the Nonconformists, ran away, saying, "They would be hanged, drawn, and quartered, before they would assist in that work"; for which cause the justices committed two of them (which they could take) to the jail. The shops were shut up, so that it seemed like a place visited with the pest, where usually is written upon the door, "Lord, have mercy upon us!"-(Narrative of Proceedings against Nonconformists, p. 5. 4to, 1670).
[146] This is a true representation of what took place in England in Bunyan's time. It was a disgrace to our nation, that Englishmen, urged on by a fanatic church, treated two young and interesting women with a barbarity that would make savages (so called) blush. It was at Carlisle that two female pilgrims, Dorothy Waugh and Ann Robinson, were dragged through the streets, with each an iron instrument of torture, called a bridle, upon their heads; and were treated with gross indecency-(ED).
[147] The great object of the Gospel is to fit man for his active duties in this world, and prepare him for heavenly enjoyments in the world to come. Not like those lazy creeping things that shut themselves up in nunneries or monasteries to avoid the temptations and troubles, the resistance or hearing of which glorifies God. Christians are to be as lights-not hid under a bushel but seen of all men. The prayer of their Lord was and is, not that they should be taken out of the world, but kept from its evil contaminations-(ED).
[148] In Bunyan's account of his imprisonment, he closes it with these words-"Thus have I, in short, declared the manner and occasion of my being in prison; where I lie waiting the good will of God to do with me as He pleaseth; knowing that not one hair of my head can fall to the ground without the will of my Father which is in Heaven. Let the rage and malice of men be ever so great, they can do no more, nor go any further, than God permits them. When they have done their worst, 'we know that all things work together for good to them that love God'" (Rom. 8:28).
[149] The description of the process against the pilgrims, is framed in such a manner as emphatically to expose the secret reasons which influence men thus to persecute their innocent neighbours. The very names employed declare the several corrupt principles of the heart from whence this atrocious conduct results-(Scott).