e said,
"were to churches what wars were to countries. Those who talked most
about religion cared least for it; and controversies about doubtful
things and things of little moment, ate up all zeal for things which were
practical and indisputable." His last sermon breathed the same catholic
spirit, free from the trammels of narrow sectarianism. "If you are the
children of God live together lovingly. If the world quarrel with you it
is no matter; but it is sad if you quarrel together. If this be among
you it is a sign of ill-breeding. Dost thou see a soul that has the
image of God in him? Love him, love him. Say, 'This man and I must go
to heaven one day.' Serve one another. Do good for one another. If any
wrong you pray to God to right you, and love the brotherhood." The
closing words of this his final testimony are such as deserve to be
written in letters of gold as the sum of all true Christian teaching: "Be
ye holy in all manner of conversation: Consider that the holy God is your
Father, and let this oblige you to live like the children of God, that
you may look your Father in the face with comfort another day." "There
is," writes Dean Stanley, "no compromise in his words, no faltering in
his convictions; but his love and admiration are reserved on the whole
for that which all good men love, and his detestation on the whole is
reserved for that which all good men detest." By the catholic spirit
which breathes through his writings, especially through "The Pilgrim's
Progress," the tinker of Elstow "has become the teacher not of any
particular sect, but of the Universal Church."

CHAPTER IX.

We have, in this concluding chapter, to take a review of Bunyan's merits
as a writer, with especial reference to the works on which his fame
mainly rests, and, above all, to that which has given him his chief title
to be included in a series of Great Writers, "The Pilgrim's Progress."
Bunyan, as we have seen, was a very copious author. His works, as
collected by the late industrious Mr. Offor, fill three bulky quarto
volumes, each of nearly eight hundred double-columned pages in small
type. And this copiousness of production is combined with a general
excellence in the matter produced. While few of his books approach the
high standard of "The Pilgrim's Progress" or "Holy War," none, it may be
truly said, sink very far below that standard. It may indeed be affirmed
that it was impossible for Bunyan to write