Page:The Pilgrim's Progress, the Holy War, Grace Abounding Chunk3.djvu/13

Rh that it must needs be that I went thither, I might be, rather a tormentor than be tormented myself.

8. A while after these terrible dreams did leave me, which also I soon forgot; for my, pleasures did quickly cut off the remembrance of them, if they had never been. Wherefore with more greediness, according to the strength of nature, I did still let loose the reins of my lust, and delighted in all transgressions against the law of God; so that, until I came to the state of marriage, I was the very ringleader in all manner of vice and ungodliness.

9. Yea, such prevalency had the lusts of the flesh on my poor soul that, had not a miracle of precious grace presented, I had not only perished by the stroke of eternal justice, but also laid myself open to the stroke of those laws which bring some to disgrace and shame before the face of the world.

10. In those days the thoughts of religion were very grievous to me. I could neither endure it myself, nor that any other should; so that When I have seen some read in those books that concerned Christian piety, it would be as it were a prison to me. Then I said unto God, "Depart from me; for I desire not the knowledge of thy ways" (Job xxi. 14). I was now, void of all good consideration—heaven and hell were both out of sight and mind; and as saving and damning, they were least in my thoughts. O Lord, thou knowest my life, and my ways are not hid from thee.

11. But this I well remember, that though I could myself sin with the greatest delight and ease, yet even then, if I had at any time seen wicked things by those who who professed goodness, it would make my spirit tremble. As once above all the rest when I was in the heigh of of vanity, yet hearing one to swear that was reckoned for a religious man, it had so great a stroke upon spirits that it made my heart ache.

12. But God did not utterly leave me, but followed me still, not with convictions, but judgments, mixed with mercy. For once I fell into a creek of the see and hardly escaped