The Works of John Bunyan, vol 3, John Bunyan [ebook reader color screen TXT] 📗

he comes to the Prince’s pavilion, as the first, and asked to speak with his Majesty; so word was carried to Emmanuel, and the Prince came out to the man. When Mr. Desires-awake saw the Prince, he fell flat with his face to the ground, and cried out, oh that Mansoul might live before thee! and with that he presented the petition. The which when the Prince had read, he turned away for a while and wept, but, refraining himself, he turned again to the man, who all this while lay crying at his feet as at the first, and said to him, Go thy way to thy place, and I will consider of thy requests.

Now you may think that they of Mansoul that had sent him, what with guilt, and what with fear, lest their petition should be rejected, could not but look with many a long look, and that too with strange workings of heart, to see what would become of their petition. At last, they saw their messenger coming back; so when he was come, they asked him how he fared, what Emmanuel said, and what was become of the petition. But he told them that he would be silent till he came to the prison to my Lord Mayor, my Lord Will-be-will, and Mr. Recorder. So he went forwards towards the prison-house, where the men of Mansoul lay bound. But oh! what a multitude flocked after to hear what the messenger said. So when he was come and had shown himself at the grate of the prison, my Lord Mayor himself looked as white as a clout, the Recorder also did quake; but they asked and said, Come, good sir, what did the great Prince say to you? Then said Mr. Desires-awake, when I came to my Lord’s pavilion, I called, and he came forth; so I fell prostrate at his feet, and delivered to him my petition, for the greatness of his person, and the glory of his countenance would not suffer me to stand upon my legs. Now as he received the petition, I cried, oh that Mansoul might live before thee! So, when for a while he had looked thereon, he turned him about, and said to his servant, Go thy way to thy place again, and I will consider of thy requests. The messenger added, moreover, and said, The Prince to whom you sent me is such a one for beauty and glory, that whoso sees him must both love and fear him; I, for my part, can do no less; but I know not what will be the end of these things.[186] At this answer they were all at a stand; both they in prison, and they that followed the messenger thither to hear the news; nor knew they what or what manner of interpretation to put upon what the Prince had said. Now, when the prison was cleared of the throng, the prisoners among themselves began to comment upon Emmanuel’s words. My Lord Mayor said that the answer did not look with a rugged face; but Will-be-will said that it betokened evil; and the Recorder, that it was a messenger of death. Now, they that were left, and that stood behind, and so could not so well hear what the prisoners said, some of them catched hold of one piece of a sentence, and some on a bit of another; some took hold of what the messenger said, and some of the prisoners’ judgment thereon; so none had the right understanding of things; but you cannot imagine what work these people made, and what a confusion there was in Mansoul now.[187]

For presently they that had heard what was said, flew about the town; one crying one thing, and another the quite contrary, and both were sure enough they told the truth, for they did hear, they said, with their ears what was said, and therefore could not be deceived. One would say, We must all be killed; another would say, We must all be saved; and a third would say that the Prince would not be concerned with Mansoul; and a fourth that the prisoners must be suddenly put to death. And as I said, every one stood to it that he told his tale the rightest, and that all others but he were out. Wherefore Mansoul had now molestation upon molestation, nor could any man know on what to rest the sole of his foot; for one would go by now, and as he went, if he heard his neighbour tell his tale, to be sure he would tell the quite contrary, and both would stand in it that he told the truth. Nay, some of them had got this story by the end, that the Prince did intend to put Mansoul to the sword. And now it began to be dark; wherefore poor Mansoul was in sad perplexity all that night until the morning.[188]

But, so far as I could gather, by the best information that I could get, all this hubbub came through the words that the Recorder said, when he told them that in his judgment the Prince’s answer was a messenger of death. It was this that fired the town, and that began the fright in Mansoul, for Mansoul, in former times, did use to count that Mr. Recorder was a seer, and that his sentence was equal to the best of oracles, and thus was Mansoul a terror to itself.

And now did they begin to feel what was the effects of stubborn rebellion, and unlawful resistance against their Prince. I say they now began to feel the effects thereof by guilt and fear, that now had swallowed them up, and who more involved in the one, but they who were most in the other; to wit, the chief of the town of Mansoul.

To be brief, when the fame189 of the fright was out of the town, and the prisoners had a little recovered themselves, they take to themselves some heart, and think to petition the Prince for life again. So they did draw up a third petition, the contents whereof were this:—

‘Prince Emmanuel the Great, Lord of all worlds, and Master of mercy, We, thy poor, wretched, miserable, dying town of Mansoul, do confess unto thy great and glorious Majesty that we have sinned against thy Father and thee, and are no more worthy to be called thy Mansoul, but rather to be cast into the pit. If thou wilt slay us, we have deserved it. If thou wilt condemn us to the deep, we cannot but say thou art righteous. We cannot complain, whatever thou dost, or however thou carriest it towards us. But oh! let mercy reign; and let it be extended to us! Oh let mercy take hold upon us, and free us from our transgressions, and we will sing of thy mercy and of thy judgment. Amen.’

This petition, when drawn up, was designed to be sent to the Prince as the first, but who should carry it, that was the question. Some said, Let him do it that went with the first; but others thought not good to do that, and that because he sped no better. Now there was an old man in the town, and his name was Mr. Good-deed; a man that bare only the name, but had nothing of the nature of the thing.

Now some were for sending of him, but the Recorder was by no means for that, for, said he, we now stand in need of, and are pleading for mercy, wherefore to send our petition by a man of this name will seem to cross the petition itself. Should we make Mr. Good-deed our messenger when our petition cries for mercy?

‘Besides,’ quoth the old gentleman, ‘should the Prince now, as he receives the petition, ask him and say, What is thy name? as nobody knows but he will, and he should say, Old Good-deed, what, think you, would Emmanuel say but this, Aye! is old Good-deed yet alive in Mansoul? then let old Good-deed save you from your distresses?

And if he says so, I am sure we are lost; nor can a thousand of old Good-deeds save Mansoul.’[190]

After the Recorder had given in his reasons why old Good-deed should not go with this petition to Emmanuel, the rest of the prisoners and chief of Mansoul opposed it also, and so old Good-deed was laid aside, and they agreed to send Mr. Desires-awake again; so they sent for him, and desired him that he would a second time go with their petition to the Prince, and he readily told them he would.

But they bid him that in anywise he would take heed that in no word or carriage he gave offence to the Prince, for by doing so, for ought we can tell, you may bring Mansoul into utter destruction, said they.

Now Mr. Desires-awake, when he saw that he must go of this errand, besought that they would grant that Mr. Wet-eyes might go with him. Now this Mr. Wet-eyes was a near neighbour of Mr. Desires, a poor man, a man of a broken spirit, yet one that could speak well to a petition. So they granted that he should go with him.

Wherefore they address themselves to their business. Mr. Desires put a rope upon his head, and Mr. Wet-eyes went with hands wringing together.[191] Thus they went to the Prince’s pavilion.

Now when they went to petition this third time, they were not without thoughts that by often coming they might be a burden to the Prince. Wherefore, when they were come to the door of his pavilion, they first made their apology for themselves, and for their coming to trouble Emmanuel so often; and they said that they came not hither to-day for that they delighted in being troublesome, or for that they delighted to hear themselves talk, but for that necessity caused them to come to his Majesty: they could, they said, have no rest day nor night, because of their transgressions against Shaddai, and against Emmanuel, his Son. They also thought that some misbehaviour of Mr. Desires-awake the last time, might give distaste to his Highness, and so cause that he returned from so merciful a Prince empty, and without countenance. So when they had made this apology, Mr. Desires-awake cast himself prostrate upon the ground as at the first, at the feet of the mighty Prince, saying, Oh that Mansoul might live before thee! and so he delivered his petition. The Prince then having read the petition, turned aside awhile, as before, and, coming again to the place where the petitioner lay on the ground, he demanded what his name was, and of what esteem in the account of Mansoul; for that he, above all the multitude in Mansoul, should be sent to him upon such an errand. Then said the man to the Prince, ‘Oh let not my Lord be angry; and why inquirest thou after the name of such a dead dog as I am? Pass by, I pray thee, and take no notice of who I am, because there is, as thou very well knowest, so great a disproportion between me and thee. Why the townsmen chose to send me on this errand to my Lord, is best known to themselves, but it could not be for that they thought that I had favour with my Lord. For my part, I am out of charity with myself; who then should be in love with me? Yet live I would, and so would I that my townsmen should, and because both they and myself are guilty of great transgressions, therefore they have sent me, and I am come in their names to beg of my Lord for mercy. Let it please thee therefore to incline to mercy, but ask not what