ordinary method of bringing souls to Christ, is that of which we speak; wherein he calls us to be workers together with him, and in which he gives us the promise of his support and blessing to the end of the world.

Let it be admitted that there was something peculiar in the case of Bunyan, both as a man, and as a Minister. Yet that peculiarity does not belong to the nature, or tendency of the Holy Spirit's influence, but only to its degree and depth, as modified by acting through so rich a combination of faculties, with so little aid from without. And this explains the reason of Bunyan's popularity with the great mass of experimental Christians, every where. He opens to them his own deeply exercised heart, and their hearts throb with vital sympathy. He goes beyond them, but still they feel that he is one of them. He holds in his hand a key that opens the most intricate wards of their own religious experience. He at once interprets, confirms, and exalts their pious emotions while he describes his own, and shows them the just and solid foundation for those emotions in the Scripturesin the revealed character and glory of God, in the perfection of his law, in the terrible evil of sin, in the sufferings of Christ as a Redeemer, in the sanctifying influences of the Spirit, in the beauty of holiness, in the brevity of life, in the insignificance of worldly good, and the all-absorbing greatness of an advancing eternity, with its judicial awards of human destiny. On all these things his spiritual discernment is wonderful. And hence from his pen, now, as once from his living lips, the Gospel comes, "not in word only, but in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance." And hence, also, however often read, his writings are always new.

In pursuance, therefore, of this process in the Author's ministerial course, the several volumes issued by our Society will be arranged. In the present volume we shall group together the works most fitted to awaken the conscience of the care

less; in the next volume, those most suited to invite and encourage awakened sinners to come to Christ for salvation, by unfolding his gracious offices, relations and benefits; and in those volumes which follow, to search the spirits of professors, and build up sincere believers in the full life, power, and joy of their holy faith. Thus each volume, also, being complete of itself, may be sold separately, and may be employed as a specific means of effecting specific good.

But something more than arrangement has been attempted in this edition. Treatises have been divided into chapters; paragraphs brought into their natural connexion; sentences shortened, and made clear by proper punctuation; references rearranged and verified; a few pleonasms retrenched; some obsolete words changed; and ungrammatical forms, as well as errors of the press, corrected. Something has also been done to remove the perplexity of too minute divisions. In short, the work of the Editor has been directed, without altering the texture of Bunyan's style, to show to the reader "how forcible are right words" on religious topics when uttered in pure old English, from a soul like Bunyan's.

When we look around us, and see what is done by private publishers, by Publication Societies, by artists and by critics, by trade sales, and by Colporteur operations, to multiply, embellish and circulate the Pilgrim's Progress, &c. the words of his friend Charles Doe, "the Struggler (as he calls himself) for the preservation of Bunyan's works," seem to have in them more than the mere enthusiasm of friendship, or the forecast of critical sagacity. Written a hundred and sixty years since, they sound now as if endowed with

-something of prophetic strain."

"Christians in town and country (he observes) can testify that their comforts under his ministry have been to an admiration, so that their joy showed itself by much weeping. His Pilgrim's Progress wins so smoothly upon the affections, aud

so insensibly distils the Gospel into them, that a hundred thousand have been printed [within thirteen years] in England; besides that, it hath been printed in France, Holland, New England, Welsh; whereby the Author has become famous. And it may be the cause of spreading his other Gospel books over the European and American world, and in process of time, it may be, to the whole universe."

Of the particular works, of an awakening character, associated in the present volume, a few words will now be said.

The first (from which the volume takes its name), “THE GREATNESS OF THE SOUL," is scarcely known among us, though one of the noblest of Bunyan's practical works. It was originally delivered in a series of discourses at Pinner's Hall, London, and was published in 1682, the same year with the "Holy War." It is undoubtedly the basis of that fine Allegory-in the opinion of Rev. Albert Barnes, "one of the greatest books ever made." "This consideration itself (says Mr. Philip), throws much light upon both the Allegory and the Pinner's Hall Sermon. They are worthy of each other. Indeed, had not Bunyan been pondering the Greatness, and thus, the worth of the Soul, he could not have found in it the Population of Mansoul, nor even its Magistracy. On the other hand, had not the Powers and Affections of the Soul taken allegoric forms and military action, which derive life from well known men and events, even he could not have condensed the massive thoughts, nor struck out the brilliant lights, that abound in the Sermon. This hint renders criticism utterly needless in the case of the Treatise on the Soul. It is the mine out of which he dug all the ore of his Allegory."

From these remarks, it is evident nothing could be more appropriate, in view of the relation between the two works, than that the Holy War should be immediately followed by the Greatness of the Soul. The comparison between them must be full of interest, independent of the great

merits of the latter in itself, and in its relation to the other works which follow it in this volume. Indeed, there is reason to believe (as Mr. Philip observes, Life and Times, p. 453) that this is the sermon, or rather series of sermons on the Greatness of the Soul, which Dr. Owen attended with such admiration, and which prompted his emphatic reply to Charles II. already mentioned "They account (adds Mr. Philip) for the electrifying effects of his Ministry." To say nothing of other parts, what has modern eloquence to offer more awfully sublime than the passage, commencing page 137 of this volume on the Loss of the Soul?

The second work, entitled "SIGHS FROM HELL, or THE GROANS OF A LOST SOUL," naturally follows, as it seems to take up the subject where the other leaves it; and illustrates in a thousand lights the condition of a lost soul, especially in the intermediate state between Death and the Resurrection. It is a sort of running comment on the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus in the sixteenth chapter of Luke; but such a comment as no other man could write except John Bunyan. Here, he indeed, appears a Boanerges, and many of his thoughts are more terrible than thunderbolts to the guilty soul. "Hell is naked before him, and Destruction hath no covering." It is remarkable that this, the first of Bunyan's praetical works, was written about the same time with Baxter's "Call to the Unconverted," in 1657. It is not certain which was published first. Their object is the same; their method only is different, illustrating the variety of their Lord's gifts; the books had like power, popularity and usefulness. Baxter was thirteen years older than Bunyan, and had better advantages of education. Baxter pleads and persuades, more like a practised pious writer; Bunyan warns and entreats sinners, "as one sent to them from the dead." Mr. Philip justly observes, "There was, from the first, in Bunyan's spirit, as in Whitfield's, a 'secret place of thunder,' and 'a fountain of tears,' that discharged.

alternate bursts of terror and tenderness-bolts of Sinai, and dew of Hermon. And this twofold power he retained to the end of life; but he never displayed it better than in the first outpourings of his baptized spirit, whilst he knew nothing about the art of writing for the press."

The third treatise on the "RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD and ETERNAL JUDGMENT," was written in Bedford jail, and published in 1665. It shows that he had made great progress as a writer. It will be found also a sort of continuation, and suitable companion of the other two; conducting us with a solemn grandeur through the closing scenes of Time, the Soul's reinvestment with bodily form and powers, and its final trial before the Judgment-seat of Christ. "Calm in its solemnity, and close in its reasonings, and sparing of epithets, there are many sublime and beautiful passages in it," which show that prison walls could not cripple the energies of his Christian faith, nor shut out from the sufferer's heart the consolations of immortal hope. In the contemplation of the glories and terrors of the Last Day, we see the grand counterpoise to all the trials which he had been for years enduring, and which through the malice of his ene

From the sublime

mies he was yet for years to endure. views of "the recompense of reward" derived from the Scriptures, habitually cherished, and so forcibly presented in this awakening treatise, Bunyan's soul gathered that invincible resolution, which bore him through his long imprisonment, and breathed in these memorable words: “My Principles, indeed, are such as lead me to a denial to communicate with the Ungodly and Profane in the things of the kingdom of Christ. Neither can I consent, in or by the superstitious inventions of this world, that my soul should be governed in any of my approaches to God; because commanded to the contrary, and commended for so refusing. . . But if nothing will do, unless I make my Conscience a continual butchery or slaughter-shop-unless, putting out mine.

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