2. Greatheart had just returned to his Master's house from having seen
Mr. Fearing safely through all his troubles and well over the river,
when, behold, another caravan of pilgrims is ready for his convoy. For
Greatheart, you must know, was the Interpreter's armed servant. When at
any time Greatheart was off duty, which in those days was but seldom, he
took up his quarters again in the Interpreter's house. As he says
himself, he came back from the river-side only to look out of the
Interpreter's window to see if there was any more work on the way for him
to do. And, as good luck would have it, as has been said, the guide was
just come back from his adventures with Mr. Fearing when a pilgrim party,
than which he had never seen one more to his mind, was introduced to him
by his Master, the Interpreter. "The Interpreter," so we read at this
point, "then called for a man-servant of his, one Greatheart, and bid him
take sword, and helmet, and shield, and take these, my daughters," said
he, "and conduct them to the house called Beautiful, at which place they
will rest next. So he took his weapons and went before them, and the
Interpreter said, God-speed."
3. Now I saw in my dream that they went on, and Greatheart went before
them, so they came to the place where Christian's burden fell off his
back and tumbled into a sepulchre. Here, then, they made a pause, and
here also they blessed God. "Now," said Christiana, "it comes to my mind
what was said to us at the gate; to wit, that we should have pardon by
word and by deed. What it is to have pardon by deed, Mr. Greatheart, I
suppose you know; wherefore, if you please, let us hear your discourse
thereof." "So then, to speak to the question," said Greatheart. You
have all heard about the "question-day" at Highland communions. That day
is so called because questions that have arisen in the minds of "the men"
in connection with doctrine and with experience are on that day set
forth, debated out, and solved by much meditation and prayer; age,
saintliness, doctrinal and experimental reading, and personal experience
all making their contribution to the solution of the question in hand.
Just such a question, then, and handled in such a manner, was that
question which whiled the way and cheated the toil till the pilgrims came
to the House Beautiful. The great doctrinal and experimental Puritans,
with Hooker at their head, put forth their full strength and laid out
their finest work just on this same question that Christiana gave out at
the place, somewhat ascending, upon which stood a cross, and a little
below, in the bottom, a sepulchre. But not the great Comment on The
Galatians itself, next to the Holy Bible as it is, as most fit for a
wounded conscience; no, nor that perfect mass of purest gold, The Learned
Discourse of Justification, nor anything else of that kind known to me,
is for one moment, to compare in beauty, in tenderness, in eloquence, in
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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