On September 13, 1672, John Bunyan was freed and pardoned.

We have previously taken a brief look at The Pilgrim’s Progress.  The reader may wish to refer back to the prior posting for our preliminary introduction to this classic.  As previously alluded to, Bunyan began this work while imprisoned in the Bedfordshire county prison for violations of the Conventicle Act.  This act prohibited holding religious services outside the auspices of the Church of England.  It may be that this work began as a direct result of being jailed for writing his spiritual autobiography, Grace Abounding  To the Chief of Sinners.

In the Similitude of A Dream, the first part, introduces the book as a dream sequence narrated by an omniscient narrator telling  the tale of Christian (everyman) on his journey from his hometown.  Which hometown, you ask?  Naturally, the “City of Destruction” that is found in all of this world.  To where you ask?  to that “Celestial City” otherwise known as Heaven.

It’s not an easy journey as you might well imagine.  After all, he is weighed down by knowing his sins  as confirmed in the Bible might well be good cause to sink him into that unbearable Hell.  But there is a promised deliverance through the “Wicket Gate”.  As the gate is invisible, the Evangelist advises him to follow the light.  And so he does, leaving behind all else .. including wife and children who cannot be convinced of the rightness of his path.  And .. so the journey begins…

Care to know more?

The Pilgrim’s Progress may be read beginning here:

http://www.bartleby.com/15/1/101.html

Or, alternatively, listened to in its audiobook format here: