he was a remarkable person. They mentioned him to Mr. Gifford, the
minister of the Baptist Church at Bedford. John Gifford had, at the
beginning of the Civil War, been a loose young officer in the king's
army. He had been taken prisoner when engaged in some exploit which
was contrary to the usages of war. A court-martial had sentenced him
to death, and he was to have been shot in a few hours, when he broke
out of his prison with his sister's help, and, after various
adventures, settled at Bedford as a doctor. The near escape had not
sobered him. He led a disorderly life, drinking and gambling, till the
loss of a large sum of money startled him into seriousness. In the
language of the time he became convinced of sin, and joined the
Baptists, the most thorough-going and consistent of all the Protestant
sects. If the Sacrament of Baptism is not a magical form, but is a
personal act, in which the baptised person devotes himself to Christ's
service, to baptise children at an age when they cannot understand
what they are doing may well seem irrational and even impious.

Gifford, who was now the head of the Baptist community in the town,
invited Bunyan to his house, and explained the causes of his distress
to him. He was a lost sinner. It was true that he had parted with his
old faults, and was leading a new life. But his heart was unchanged;
his past offences stood in record against him. He was still under the
wrath of God, miserable in his position, and therefore miserable in
mind. He must become sensible of his lost state, and lay hold of the
only remedy, or there was no hope for him.

There was no difficulty in convincing Bunyan that he was in a bad way.
He was too well aware of it already. In a work of fiction, the
conviction would be followed immediately by consoling grace. In the
actual experience of a living human soul, the medicine operates less
pleasantly.

'I began,' he says, 'to see something of the vanity and inward
wretchedness of my wicked heart, for as yet I knew no great matter
therein. But now it began to be discovered unto me, and to work for
wickedness as it never did before. Lusts and corruptions would
strongly put themselves forth within me in wicked thoughts and desires
which I did not regard before. Whereas, before, my soul was full of
longing after God; now my heart began to hanker after every foolish
vanity.'

Constitutions differ. Mr. Gifford's treatment, if it was ever good for
any man, was too