Evangelist asked, "Why are you afraid to die since you are so unhappy now and find in this life so much care and sorrow?"
"Sir," said Christian, "I read in this book that `it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment' (Heb. 9:2727And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: (Hebrews 9:27)), and it is that that makes me so afraid, for knowing as I do that I am not fit to die, how can I be fit to come into judgment? For if I come into judgment, I know that there is nothing for me but to be eternally lost."
Evangelist was really a messenger of glad tidings, for after telling Christian to "flee from the wrath to come" (Matt. 3:77But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come? (Matthew 3:7)), he pointed to a wicket-gate still at some distance and asked if he could see it. But poor Christian's eyes, swollen and almost blinded with tears as they were, could not see so far off.
Evangelist then asked if he could see a shining light. Christian thought he did. Then Evangelist told him to keep the light in view and go on toward the gate; when he reached it he would be told what to do.
Christian began to run, but he had not gone many yards from his own door before he heard voices calling to him to come back, and looking around, he saw that his own wife and children, Evangelist Points the Way who the day before had said he was going out of his mind, were calling upon him to return.
Many neighbors also came out of their houses to look and wonder, but for all he had only one answer. He told them that he dared not stay in the City of Destruction, for he did not know how soon the judgments of God might fall upon it; if there was time he must escape. Very gladly would he have taken his wife and children with him, but they laughed at his warnings and refused to leave the land of their birth.
Two of his neighbors, whom Bunyan calls Obstinate and Pliable, made up their minds to follow him, never for a moment doubting that they should be able to persuade him to go back with them to the doomed city.
He had gone some distance before they overtook him. They began to urge him to go back with them to the city. But his answer was, "That cannot be. I like yourselves was born in the City of Destruction, but if I remain there my soul will be eternally lost, for after death follows judgment. Be content, good neighbors, to go along with me."
"What," cried Obstinate, "and leave all our friends and comforts behind us?"
"Ah," Christian replied, "the things you forsake are of such little value that they are not worth being put by the side of those I seek, which are eternal joys and will last forever."
"Tell us," said Obstinate, "what are the things you seek, that you are leaving all the pleasures of this world to find them?"
"I seek," said Christian, " 'an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away' (1 Peter 1:44To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, (1 Peter 1:4)). You may read about it for yourself in my book, if you will."
"Take away your book," said Obstinate. "All we want to know is, Will you go back with us or not?"
Finding that Christian had fully made up his mind to go forward, Obstinate said to his neighbor Pliable, "Since he will not turn back with us, let us go home without him; there are others like himself, whom I could name, who if they take a fancy into their head will not be talked out of it, and think they are wiser than seven wise men."
"Wait a little," said Pliable. "If what neighbor Christian says is true, and the things he seeks are really as good as he believes them to be, I have more than half a mind to go with him."
After a little more conversation, Obstinate and Pliable parted company, Obstinate to return to his own house and Pliable to go a little way with our pilgrim.
"But tell me, neighbor," said Pliable, "do you know the way to the far-off place we have set out to seek?"
"I was told," said Christian, "by a man named Evangelist, to make all speed I could toward the little gate that is before us, and there we shall receive directions as to the way."
"Come then, good neighbor," said Pliable. "Let us be going." As they walked Pliable had many questions to ask about the place to which they were going, what company they should find there, and other things of which Christian told him he had read in his book.
For some time they went on without taking much notice of which way they were going, till they came to a large, miry bog, which lay just across their path, called the Slough of Despond, into which they both fell. After a few struggles Pliable began to be offended and called out to his companion, "Where are you now?"
"I hardly know," said Christian, "for the burden upon my back is so heavy that I am almost ready to sink in the mire of the slough."