Bible Stories and Religious ClassicsWells, Philip P. (Philip Patterson)
Religion
Bible Stories and Religious Classics
Wells, Philip P. (Philip Patterson)
Bible stories, English -- Juvenile literature; Christian literature for children
Then I saw in my dream, that the Shepherds had them to another place in
a bottom, where was a door on the side of a hill; and they opened the
door, and bid them look in. They looked in, therefore, and saw that
within it was very dark and smoky; they also thought that they heard
there a rumbling noise, as of fire, and a cry of some tormented, and
they smelled the scent of brimstone. Then said Christian, What means
this? The Shepherds told them, This is a by-way to hell, a way that
hypocrites go in at; namely, such as sell their birthright, with Esau;
such as sell their Master, with Judas; such as blaspheme the gospel,
with Alexander; and that lie and dissemble, with Ananias and Sapphira
his wife.
Then said Hopeful to the Shepherds, I perceive that these had on them,
even every one, a show of pilgrimage, as we have now; had they not?
_Shep._ Yes, and held it a long time too.
_Hope._ How far might they go on in pilgrimage in their day, since they,
notwithstanding, were thus miserably cast away?
_Shep._ Some further, and some not so far as these mountains.
Then said the pilgrims one to another, We have need to cry to the Strong
for strength.
_Shep._ Ay, and you will have need to use it, when you have it too.
By this time the pilgrims had a desire to go forward, and the Shepherds
a desire they should; so they walked together toward the end of the
mountains. Then said the Shepherds one to another, Let us here show the
pilgrims the gate of the Celestial City, if they have skill to look
through our perspective-glass. The pilgrims then lovingly accepted the
motion; so they had them to the top of a high hill, called Clear, and
gave them the glass to look.
Then they tried to look; but the remembrance of that last thing that the
Shepherds had shown them made their hands shake, by means of which
impediment they could not look steadily through the glass; yet they
thought they saw something like the gate, and also some of the glory of
the place. Thus they went away and sang:
Thus by the Shepherds secrets are reveal'd
Which from all other men are kept conceal'd:
Come to the Shepherds, then, if you would see
Things deep, things hid, and that mysterious be.
When they were about to depart, one of the Shepherds gave them a note of
the way. Another of them bid them beware of the Flatterer. The third bid
them take heed that they sleep not upon Enchanted Ground. And the fourth
bid them God speed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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