Page:The pilgrims progress as originally published by John Bunyan ; being a facsimile of the first edition (1878).djvu/13

Rh numerous instances these notes have a value of their own, either as samples of the rough vernacular of the author's original book, or as indications of his mode of thought.

This first edition, more than any subsequent one, is replete with quaint expressions in rugged Saxon-English, and with other elements of style which induced Bunyan to say in his "Apology":—

And although the great allegorist never materially changed his handiwork, he did make alterations in his grammar and orthography in the course of the eight editions which he lived to revise. Add to this that his numerous editors have also carried on the work of modification for nearly two centuries; and it will at once be evident that it is a matter of real importance for the reading public of to-day to see what Bunyan really wrote and issued in the first instance.

To compass this end, no pains have been spared. In all those matters of orthography, grammar, rough or quaint expression, graphical