Page:The pilgrim's progress by John Bunyan every child can read (1909).djvu/381

Rh that we shall be more glad to see them there than to see they are wanting?

Well, I perceive whereabouts you are as to this. Have you any more things to ask me about my beginning to come on pilgrimage?

Yes. Were your father and mother willing that you should become a pilgrim?

Oh, no; they used all means imaginable to persuade me to stay at home.

Why, what could they say against it?

They said it was an idle life; and, if I myself were not inclined to sloth and laziness, I would never favor a pilgrim's condition.

And what did they say else?

Why, they told me that it was a dangerous way: "Yea, the most dangerous way in the world," said they, "is that which the pilgrims go."

Did they show you wherein this way is so dangerous?

Yes; and that in many particulars.

Name some of them.

They told me of the Slough of Despond, where Christian was well-nigh smothered. They told me that there were archers standing ready in Beelzebub's castle to shoot them who should knock at the wicket-gate for entrance. They told me also of the wood and dark mountains of the Hill Difficulty; of the lions; and also of the three giants, Bloody-man, Maul, and Slay-good. They said moreover that there was a foul fiend