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

WISE. You have given it a very right description, in calling of it the father and mother of a great many other prodigious wickednesses; for it is so venomous and vile a thing that it puts the whole course of nature out of order, and makes it fit for nothing but confusion, and a hold for every evil thing: ‘For where envying and strife is, there is confusion, and every evil work’ (James 3:16).

Wherefore, I say, you have rightly called it the very father and mother of a great many other sins. And now for our further edification, I will reckon up of some of the births of envy. 1.

Envy, as I told you before, it rotteth the very bones of him that entertains it. And, 2. As you have also hinted, it is heavier than a stone, than sand; yea, and I will add, it falls like a millstone upon the head. Therefore, 3. It kills him that throws it, and him at whom it is thrown. ‘Envy slayeth the silly one’ (Job 5:2). That is, him in whom it resides, and him who is its object. 4. It was that also that slew Jesus Christ himself; for his adversaries persecuted him through their envy (Matt 27:18; Mark 15:10). 5.

Envy was that, by virtue of which Joseph was sold by his brethren into Egypt (Acts 7:9).

6. It is envy that hath the hand in making of variance among God’s saints (Isa 11:13). 7. It is envy in the hearts of sinners, that stirs them up to trust God’s ministers out of their coasts (Acts 13:50, 14:6). 8. What shall I say? It is envy that is the very nursery of whisperings, debates, backbitings, slanders, reproaches, murders, &c.

It is not possible to repeat all the particular fruits of this sinful root. Therefore, it is no marvel that Mr. Badman was such an ill-natured man, for the great roots of all manner of wickedness were in him unmortified, unmaimed, untouched.

ATTEN. But it is a rare case, even this of Mr. Badman, that he should never in all his life be touched with remorse for his ill-spent life.

CHAPTER XIII.

[HE GETS DRUNK AND BREAKS HIS LEG—GOD’S JUDGMENTS UPON DRUNKARDS.]

WISE. Remorse, I cannot say he ever had, if by remorse you mean repentance for his evils. Yet twice I remember he was under some trouble of mind about his condition. Once when he broke his leg as he came home drunk from the ale-house; and another time when he fell sick, and thought he should die. Besides these two times, I do not remember any more.

ATTEN. Did he break his leg then?

WISE. Yes; once as he came home drunk from the ale-house.

ATTEN. Pray how did he break it?

WISE. Why upon a time he was at an ale-house, that wicked house about two or three miles from home, and having there drank hard the greatest part of the day, when night was come, he would stay no longer, but calls for his horse, gets up and like a madman, as drunken persons usually ride, away he goes, as hard as horse could lay legs to the ground. Thus he rid, till coming to a dirty place, where his horse flouncing in, fell, threw his master, and with his fall broke his leg. So there he lay. But you would not think how he swore at first. But after a while, he coming to himself, and feeling by his pain, and the uselessness of his leg, what case he was in, and also fearing that this bout might be his death; he began to cry out after the manner of such, Lord help me, Lord have mercy upon me, good God deliver me, and the like.

So there he lay, till some came by, who took him up, carried him home, where he lay for some time, before he could go abroad again.

ATTEN. And then you say he called upon God.

WISE. He cried out in his pain, and would say, O God, and, O

Lord, help me. But whether it was that his sin might be pardoned, and his soul saved, or whether to be rid of his pain, I will not positively determine; though I fear it was but for the last; because when his pain was gone, and he had got hopes of mending, even before he could go abroad, he cast off prayer, and began his old game; to wit, to be as bad as he was before.[67] He then would send for his old companions; his sluts also would come to his house to see him, and with them he would be, as well as he could for his lame leg, as vicious as they could be for their hearts.

ATTEN. It was a wonder he did not break his neck.

WISE. His neck had gone instead of his leg, but that God was long-suffering towards him; he had deserved it ten thousand times over. There have been many, as I have heard, and as I have hinted to you before, that have taken their horses when drunk as he; but they have gone from the pot to the grave; for they have broken their necks betwixt the ale-house and home. One hard by us also drunk himself dead; he drank, and died in his drink.

ATTEN. It is a sad thing to die drunk.

WISE. So it is; but yet I wonder that no more do so. For considering the heinousness of that sin, and with how many others sins it is accompanied, as with oaths, blasphemies, lies, revellings, whorings, brawlings, &c., it is a wonder to me that any that live in that sin should escape such a blow from Heaven, that should tumble them into their graves. Besides, when I consider also how, when they are as drunk as beasts, they, without all fear of danger, will ride like bedlams and madmen, even as if they did dare God to meddle with them if he durst, for their being drunk. I say, I wonder that he doth not withdraw his protecting providences from them, and leave them to those dangers and destructions that by their sin they have deserved, and that by their bedlam madness they would rush themselves into. Only I consider again, that he has appointed a day wherein he will reckon with them, and doth also commonly make examples of some, to show that he takes notice of their sin, abhors their way, and will count with them for it at the set time (Acts 17:30,31).

ATTEN. It is worthy of our remark, to take notice how God, to show his dislike of the sins of men, strikes some of them down with a blow; as the breaking of Mr. Badman’s leg, for doubtless that was a stroke from heaven.

WISE. It is worth our remark, indeed. It was an open stroke, it fell upon him while he was in the height of his sin; and it looks much like to that in Job—‘Therefore he knoweth their works, and overturneth them in the night, so that they are destroyed. He striketh them as wicked men in the open sight of others.’ Or, as the margin reads it, ‘in the place of beholders’ (Job 34:25,26).

He lays them, with his stroke, in the place of beholders. There was Mr. Badman laid; his stroke was taken notice of by every one, his broken leg was at this time the town talk. Mr. Badman has broken his leg, says one. How did he break it? says another. As he came home drunk from such an ale-house, said a third. A judgment of God upon him, said a fourth. This his sin, his shame, and punishment, are all made conspicuous to all that are about him. I will here tell you another story or two.

I have read, in Mr. Clark’s Looking-glass for Sinners, that upon a time a certain drunken fellow boasted in his cups that there was neither heaven nor hell; also he said he believed that man had no soul, and that, for his own part, he would sell his soul to any that would buy it. Then did one of his companions buy it of him for a cup of wine, and presently the devil, in man’s shape, bought it of that man again at the same price; and so, in the presence of them all, laid hold on the soul-seller, and carried him away through the air, so that he was never more heard of.[68]

He tells us also, that there was one at Salisbury, in the midst of his health, drinking and carousing in a tavern; and he drank a health to the devil, saying that if the devil would not come and pledge him, he would not believe that there was either God or devil. Whereupon his companions, stricken with fear, hastened out of the room; and presently after, hearing a hideous noise, and smelling a stinking savour, the vintner ran up into the chamber; and coming in he missed his guest, and found the window broken, the iron bar in it bowed, and all bloody. But the man was never heard of afterwards.[69]

Again, he tells us of a bailiff of Hedley, who, upon a Lord’s day, being drunk at Melford, got upon his horse, to ride through the streets, saying that his horse would carry him to the devil. And presently his horse threw him, and broke his neck. These things are worse than the breaking of Mr. Badman’s leg; and should be a caution to all of his friends that are living, lest they also fall by their sin into these sad judgments of God.

But, as I said, Mr. Badman quickly forgot all; his conscience was choked before his leg was healed. And, therefore, before he was well of the fruit of one sin, he tempts God to send another judgment to seize upon him. And so he did quickly after. For not many months after his leg was well, he had a very dangerous fit of sickness, insomuch that now he began to think he must die in very deed.

CHAPTER XIV.

[HIS PRETENDED REPENTINGS AND PROMISES OF REFORM WHEN DEATH GRIMLY

STARES AT HIM.]

ATTEN. Well, and what did he think and do then?

WISE. He thought he must go to hell; that I know, for he could not forbear but say so. To my best remembrance, he lay crying out all one night for fear; and at times he would so tremble that he would make the very bed shake under him. But O! how the thoughts of death, of hell-fire, and of eternal judgment, did then wrack his conscience. Fear might be seen in his face, and in his tossings to and fro; it might also be heard in his words, and be understood by his heavy groans. He would often cry, I am undone, I am undone; my vile life has undone me!

ATTEN. Then his former atheistical thoughts and principles were too weak now to support him from the fears of eternal damnation.

WISE. Ay! they were too weak indeed. They may serve to stifle conscience, when a man is in the midst of his prosperity; and to harden the heart against all good counsel, when a man is left of God, and given up to his reprobate mind. But, alas, atheistical thoughts, notions, and opinions must shrink and melt away, when God sends, yea, comes with sickness to visit the soul of such a sinner for his sin. There was a man dwelt about twelve miles off from us, that had so trained up himself in his atheistical notions, that at last he attempted to write a book against Jesus Christ, and against the Divine authority of the scriptures. But I think it was not printed. Well, after many days, God struck him with sickness, whereof